What should I say? Vast trains
over brief miles and tomorrow

isn’t even here yet: is everyone
pulling everyone through unseen

hours as the moon watches? No—
the moon hears us like pieces

of doubtful music. I turn the light
back on and ask are you asleep now.

Are you asleep now? This is the hour
that curves out of our mouths

like syllables fallen into the wrong
words I said when you were asleep then.

What did I say? Prayer for the moon
to pull us from vacant days and buildings,

prayer for evening trains, the night’s pure
arc, these alleys where the dark slings

its body over shallow puddles and trash.
Like snow we are comforted most

by what we erase: wait for the light
to abandon these late avenues, linger

on the staircase outside your old studio,
listen for the ventral pulsings of this

almost human heart. I know how
lacing binds us like rooms along

dark halls: I know you are in the neon
air and I am wandering off: wandering

and perforated by minutes born
in the dry suspension of autumn—

what could I say? Here comes an outage
over every block and just one floor down

someone is torn apart and overheard.
I don’t know what’s left to be said:

are we hostages among the rotten
and the dead? The collected winds

fall apart, trains stop, and brush burns
again. Harrows are pulled over

fields we never tended—I never
remembered to pull from my throat

the words to make you stay more.
I know now that you are wandering off

and I am the neon air. An early light
digs up the city and is haunted.

Look into these palms lifted lightly:
there the dawn-motes are letting go.