(for Tomas Tranströmer)

 

3 AM. Moonlight,

stars. How’d we

run out of road

and gas? Countries,

currency? Spaces

where our differences

mattered? We followed

that high, long river

country to country,

currency to currency,

until it dipped under

ground and left us.

We had the sun

but it went too

and took the flame

and the long bluffs

we might have used

for cover. When’s

the last time

 

that plastic cooler

was something more

than a chair, a bag

of cheese, and two,

three cans of beer

floating in water

like insurance?

Why these words

now that doodling’s

as good a use

of paper, of lead

or ink as argument

or explanation

or petition,

heavenly or not?

3 AM. Moon.

Fuck it. I’m tired

 

of thinking, talking

about the somethings

or nothings that bracket

this world, the transit,

its terrible beauty,

deep or flat black

to light, off to on to off,

click to blinding white,

then calm or long pain.

I’m tired of endings

that have no meaning

beyond the stories

we make up. When’s

the last time you saw

a bird? I’m tired

 

of God. Yesterday,

an hour past dusk

we left our last village,

flipped the last switch.

From the rise, we saw

its mushroom of lights

blur out and we drove.

3 AM. Moon’s a scarred

palm. Here at the end

of the line’s a path

made by cows walking

tree line and fence

to grazing fields. We’d

 

go but where? Ain’t

nothing left but

distance. We’d make

love but the clocks

are broken. We’d die

before the land

gets us, but how?

Name a way. 3 AM.

A rash of stars. We

wait, hearts catfishing,

belly to throat,

 

trawling for stroke.

Remember that night,

the convertible

we drove from bar

to keg to liquor store,

the land full and loud,

until we found a swing

set under a lamp post

in the upper reaches

 

of a city park and fucked

in the grass or gravel

because the land

was good. 3 AM. Moon’s

a pisspot. Here’s one.

Your plane’s over water

that’s run bad.

 

You’ve lost your wings.

Poison’s wormed through

every exchange, spread

one part to the next.

You’re falling. Sick. What

 

to do with time? Joke. Moon

falls in a sky and no one’s.

Joke. Three warm cans

 

of beer and no gas. Joke.

Moon. Joke. Two people walk

 

into an empty bar. 3 AM.

 

 

–published in Tusculum Review, Vol. 11 (2015)