Drop your tears in the middle of a poem

Drop your tears in the middle of a poem.
See where they run.

Which word do they hang on to?
Where do they roll off the edge?

Do they fill the spaces between the lines?
Settling there in puddles
until they evaporate
leaving their salt behind.

Maybe they meander around some words,
cautious not to erode them.

Maybe they form pathways around lines
too obstinate to give way
by bending themselves
or by just dropping a word.

While you’re here,
listen to the sound they make
while navigating through the melee.
Do you hear sobs and sighs?
Does it sound like heartbreak?

The Dirty Thirty, Poem 10

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