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The Exchange (poem)

We trade things
Independence for happiness
Money for food
Our bodies for pleasure

We exchange ourselves
Self assuredness for acceptance
Money for drugs
Our hearts for mere moments when tomorrow may never come

There are no receipts for these things
No bills of lading as time has nowhere to go
And no one to receive it

We borrow from others What we give away
Need drives us to take
Whether it be in sitting next to a friend
Or in erotic embrace

Does the end come
When we’ve given away all we’ve had?
All that we are?
Does our life slip from us when every ounce of give is gone?

Is that what it means when we say
‘They were taken’?
Because they’d nothing left to give?
And to whom are they then received?

God?
The universe?
I am?