game day

The world turns gray as the sky falls down, the river of rain churning the earth into something new. The dogs' legs are sleeved with mud, their coats flecked with beads of water. I flick a heavy head of ash off a dwindling cigar. It explodes into a startled cloud, a flock of motes floating on the air. The stray particulates dissipate, seeming almost startled that they do not amount to more. I spill smoke mingled with breath into the rain streaked sky. The smoke coils and rises. I am left alone with my boundless limits, watching the rain fall down.

I sit outside as the rain spills, smoking and reading. I sit in a plastic chair, the pages spattered with the drops and flecks caught up in the restless breeze. Tiny droplets stipple my scratched-up glasses, surface tension pasting circles onto my field of vision. The words I read sift through the busy babble of disturbance and detail as I bide my time. I swallow the bitter coffee as it cools. I watch the cloud smeared sky as it streaks and knots. I wait, and I watch, and the world goes on.


Later on it's football on the TV and the dogs on the couch. The gray of the day keeps crawling on and on, the hush and press of rain, the dull creep of shadows threaded through the day. The TV takes for granted my weaknesses and addictions, selling me fantasies of wealth and excitement. Phones and cars that would change me from the slab that I am into something shining with pride and lucre. Selling me someone else's dream as my bones ache and the rain continues. Selling me wishes as the storm gathers, leaving me with what is left of my life.