FOUR POEMS

The Street Lights Flick On

We know the rain must comebut it holds its wet tonguein the sky. We aren’t childrenso mom doesn’t call and we don’tout stay the nightof streetlights. We lock ourselves indoorswith screens. The air electric.We don’t even corner a bottle,talk of loss or luck. I missthe way I could talk. I don’t talklike that anymore. There’s too many wordsracing in wires, that damned rain hoveringvoluptuous as peaches. Words so tangibleyou could eat them, like any hungry human.Of course, the street lights flick on,and tonight becomes just anotheroverripe, almost vanished thing.And my boys, their mother callseach syllableof their namesinto gloam.