I played Sid Meier’s Civilization V
on Steam out of world-weariness,
the world’s toga
a curtain its drawn over
the parts of itself
it wishes to draw your attention to.
I stare vacantly before it anyway,
smoking a cigarette in dumb allegiance
to its neon-lit backdrop
in an otherwise sequined night.
I take myself out to dinner with you.
By you I mean the world.
I am sneezed out of such experience,
lifted up, child-like, into the arms of pine trees near
pine death, a Valentine sent on the wrong day.
My day. The day you were home.
It zooms around in invented song,
a jingle on a streaming service for a toy
to replace the last one. Yes,
I am coming last. No,
I will not consider the thread
that ties up this plot
mine to sew. The toga city at the hands of Sid
forbids you
enter it unless nude. So go
back. Just not
through that door.