You’re not needed, little one.
Buzzing in my ear from too much sugar over the years.
Pick-pocketing pink petals and violet ones alike.
And white heads with yellow daylight eyes on straight green stems
moving in whatever wind. But we tolerate one another, for the moment.

That is how it goes, when you’re in a place you do not own.
Like that bald spot on top of Hump Mountain.
Like Doll Flats, burned a year or so ago.

A trail of rotten earth beaten beneath so many ignorant feet.
Counting miles.
Counting calories.
Counting pounds.
Cutting down.

You’re not needed little one.
You can not come along.

I say this to all of the world not already stuffed inside my backpack.

I can not carry you.