Write now [sic]

I need the page.
Write now.
The cold beer is to my left
the cigarette,
gripped between fingers.
Another long day precedes
another long day.
People gather
without my understanding
content with their noise.
I enjoy my silence,
but somehow the knowledge
of them there pesters me.

Exclusion by chance
keeps one alert.
The sun was already dead
when they went from one
to many.
The air mimicked ice
just so they
could be closer together.
Now I need another cigarette
another distraction.
The page is too white
when it is not seen through
the grey haze.

I am quite the people person
aren’t I.
Quite the hypocrite,
the ranter.
All for this decrepit
notion of art.
All for this.
This that is,
as always,
part of nothing.