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.

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This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 6 Number 9, on page 45
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