the incidentals

The night pretends to fall and I pretend to notice. It is enough of a plan for the incedentals. It is enough of a map for holding still. The light as it’s leaving, the heat as it lingers yet. I write one thing and then another. It seems a listing with each veer and lean. It seems like sayings once you settle on the words.

Where to go to empty all your pockets? Where to go to shake off all this shine? The top of the dresser withs its matchbooks and bad pennies. The table near the front door with its magazines and lamps. What door will you open? What window will you watch? The lamentations of ancestors, the laws of bitter kings. The breath that holds witness, the breath that lets fly. All these pens and knives.

You take one chance and then you take another. You win and win, until one day you don't. This is the set recipe, the only sure commandment. The lights, the paint, the press of flesh. All these stars so long in the sky. The first road the one of intention. The first telling much like the last. A box, a bag, a shouldered bindle. The abrupt departure much the same as the long decline. It is where there is to put the pieces. I make a wish and then learn to let it go.