If you move around town in your human body,

you move with unrequired parts
such as wisdom teeth or an appendix,
so you needn’t wonder why—
when you grocery shop alone
or as the sky darkens and you cross
an empty parking lot—that feeling
catches you: the sense you are a bit
unnecessary, removable even.
That feeling comes with you, natural

as an outdated tailbone.

It’s true the world could go on

without you and someday
it will. No matter how careful you are—
no matter how productive or cool—
someone will judge you
insufficient. Try not to join in.
Better to chew whatever stick of gum
lingers in your coat pocket and keep
walking or wheeling under this fat sky.
Your critics will bash even these clouds:
for ignoring the seasons, for sending snow
or rain at an hour humans—
in their great wisdom—don’t prefer.

Without ears,

the clouds go on floating and waste no

time speculating if they should have been
an altocumulus
or an all-important cumulonimbus—
instead, they glide, no rush, carrying
dust and water. Wherever your body
is roaming now, glance upward
at the clouds blowing west, gathering colors.
Yes, the sun would set without them,
but look, for its one minute, at all this

needless, needless purple