the night she told him
      it was over he
had begun his descent.
he picked up a bottle of
      tequila
from the liqour store as it was
      closing and, turning left on
barrymore street, headed toward the bluff-
all the while taking warm swallows
   from the bottle.
when he reached the edge,
he looked down
at the swirling water.
it was a long way down and he thought he could
      see all the way to hell.
after about forty minutes of gazing into his
     own mortality,
he stepped away from the precipice.
but something in him knew that he had jumped.

 

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