Before the starlight-swum sea
foam-feathered, crashing––
we held our shored skins
for saving.
Eventide
Orison
Tag: night
On Practice
From a book of days
The truest words were best saved for the dark because sunup had a way of making all that magic scatter back to business everyone what do you want for lunch and time to buy milk again and when exactly are you going to fit that in on top of everything else in the litany of needs churning on the cycle of these faces until the suns plunged again to be sewn into the dreams of other days by the sons at the shore, ever open-mouthed for the reaping.
After This
Next sunset
Remember after this song to seed the next shadowland of loss, following the fever of fences we built to keep us in, and terrors out, when in the shade of their heights they only heightened fears, when in the privacy of night, we meant to leap between those stars, counting.
Crosswalk
Witness, waiting.
The tracks uncross, uncoupling the stars in our eyes. It is late and the light won’t train toward the alley by the liquor store on Broadway. Saturday night leaks greasy blues against neon signs for lotto prizes and fast-food payday loans. The discount tire guy waves and falls, to be raised again, a blow-up Lazarus. Alive.
The buzz of broken streetlights reminds that everyone is hanging as you are, by the thread to which we’ve tied some whispered prayer. Give us this day, our daily bread––no, never mind, take it back. Regrets fur like smoke at the crosswalk, teasing, Go. Not Yet. Hurry. You’ll miss it again.
My eyes hurt. Show me one thing blooming. Here they are, cellophane-wrapped with other plastic-plated symbols of significance, ready for purchase, bright tokens. Pang of grief, but you work with what you have. The hungry eye learns to make do. The gas station oasis lit to magnify the lines on the faces in line, we avert our eyes in respect for one another’s naked needs.
If not this day again, give me something. I pay to spill back onto Broadway. Beneath the glow of a No Vacancy sign, I wait to cross, sated now, the stems in hand. There are others on foot, and we stand at the banks. Not yet, don’t go. You can feel something hold us by the words we still won’t speak, nudging toward the next chance to give it all away.