It could have been any of us

And just like that it wasn’t my birthday
And he wasn’t dead
Or anywhere near a pit of fire
He’d achieved marginal success
At a middling career
He just found a wife, like she’d been waiting
And you were on vacation
And I was getting fucked at the bar
But I remembered the way you used to
Pay tribute to me
And I couldn’t pick a tense
It was ever present
Like the way you leave a place
When you know you’re never coming back
It’s final, but not sudden
It stings, it hangs
You carry it, bury it, unmark it
Forget it, file it, archive it, let it go,
Burn your fingerprints
You can’t hide who you are
I’ll still know
Everyone likes a secret