He wore an alien mask on Halloween

To hide his lack of hair
And he was everybody's favorite at the parade
Because they couldn't see what had happened inside
Underneath his smile

And we watched NASCAR in his bedroom
The company temporarily healing his mutilated cells
Turning back the clock
To days we had never spent but wished we had

As I look through photos now
It all seems so long ago

“You want me to give you a testimony about my life”
Well, my life is no more than a great amalgam
of the lives of the people around me
And my testimony is perjury
Pockmarked with so many holes
So much empty space
It is no more than a faded shroud
Or a melting clock
Or a wave crashing on the shore of history
Washing all the forgotten men and women of the past
Into a sea of anonymity
Only to be spit back out
In the endless circle of time