Pine Tinder
In the stolen wonderland
of interlocked train cars, crisscross
traffic between stowaway kisses
off concrete paths,
We burn bright,
white phosphorus and corner store whiskey,
in ragged-end dress and worn elbow coat.
We are wonderous against a thousand
microphones held searching
for explanation, for the why/how
of it all.
We brush past,
unbothered in the acid glow,
cast by bent street lamps,
cast by quarter-shade phones boxes
with copper and change
long since stripped.
Until we round corners,
catch faces against motor oil pools
in blear-eyed dawn light;
How weary, how extinguished,
how like the spectacles-and-watch crowd,
we look in afterparty haze.
