#title On 5 pm
#subtitle and being told<br> that a colleague<br> had committed suicide<br> earlier that day
#author Brad Evans
#SORTauthors Brad Evans;
#date 2019
#source [[https://www.fifthestate.org/archive/402-winter-2019/on-5-pm]]
#lang en
#pubdate 2018-12-28
#notes Fifth Estate #402, Winter 2019


<quote>
What first greeted me
</quote>

<quote>
upon entering that room
</quote>

<quote>
were the sad, quiet faces
</quote>

<quote>
as we all sat around the table.
</quote>

<quote>
.
</quote>

<quote>
Thinking of her,
</quote>

<quote>
wondering why
</quote>

<quote>
and what happened
</quote>

<quote>
and some of it came out later.
</quote>

<quote>
.
</quote>

<quote>
But what was also on my thoughts
</quote>

<quote>
was finding out how management
</quote>

<quote>
had known about it all day long
</quote>

<quote>
as they readily pursued their disturbing calculation
</quote>

<quote>
.
</quote>

<quote>
In getting a full day’s work out of us
</quote>

<quote>
before breaking the news.
</quote>

Brad Evans lives in the UK working as a community library assistant. His work has most recently appeared in Studio La Primitive, Northampton Poetry Review, Backlash, and The Journal.