How can I put you down?
Nightly you must negotiate alone
fluorescent escalators, straddle
banisters gleaming neon
and noiselessly slide down.
How can I tell you ‘sleep’?
Nightly the body yearns to recreate
its lost polarity, the shape
of love unrealized, some
unborn, forgotten mate.
How can I let you cry?
Nightly you must move on
toward that point where all roads come
together into one
lost just as it touches the horizon.
How can I shut the door?
Nightly you must go through
so many dark arcades
and come back whole
clutching each morning’s clue.
