by Scott David Herman (from the Manual)

Your distance is a function of the space that falls
Between how far away you feel the need to stand

In some outlying place beyond the city walls
Of stone and steel engirded by the lightless land,

And just how far within the city's hollowed halls
And streaming streets that filled your mouth with dust and sand

You seem, by what your eye recalls; and this will weigh
In just proportion to how long you feel the deep

Imperative to move so many in the way
That you have traveled in such moments still as sleep;

And when this nearness is what you can give away,
Your distance then is yours to keep.