reach

 The day shoved its way across the sky and the sun had had its fill. The brittle yellow leaves flutter and bow with the meddlesome wind as turkey vultures catch updrafts against the becoming blue sky moon. The streets dance with leaf and litter, whirlwinds and the wake of passing traffic, the train wail scraping the walls right on time. The front porch yet again, smoke and the day’s end every day. The tree tops reach for the heavens, sunlight rustling bright upon the celebratory boughs. I reach for you, just words and want, and all the knowledge needed to know the unlikely of it to my bones.

Moon marked, wing swept, pale bones and the insistent smoke. Pine needles in the gutter, spiders in the eaves, the night is whet with greens and blues. The trees move as if each was attended by a separate wind as it dashed and it spins. The laze of the setting sun as the leaving light climbs up roof and crown. The idle attachment of eye and tongue, bird and child and flickering painted shadow, the words just running down the surface. Just here and there and the news of the moon.

In my heart there is rust and ruin, but there are still all the silly Christmas wishes and redemption narratives too. Simple palaver between the entity and the animal, the drift between deed and form, the distillation back from language. Dusk swings down from every branch, dusk goes skipping down the street. The trees do what they can, falling asleep in the gauzy starlight. The trees do what they must, swaying from the crown on down. There are words, neither mine or yours. They wander through the world beyond and between us, working their way around. The day goes with the last crow calling.