The Visit

In a city

hemmed by terse sky

& brooding sea,

where star bits muse

in silvery bites

I am startled

then annoyed

The night has spit out a raccoon,

a gray shard of wilderness

come to scrape against my comfort,

come to die upon my porch

From dark smudge caves

the pit-black

spark eyes

poke out,

fierce, wary, bewildered

He has navigated the nocturnal minefields

armed with nature’s articulation,

white Saturn rings

thick matted coat

clever, clawed hands

expressive of digging in dark soil

& concealing young

in constructs of wet earth and leaves

He is a confluence of fur & branch,

the instincts of wind and moonlight

rippling off tall grass

now de-constructed

into skittish moments

beneath cars dripping oil 

& throbbing radios

Scavenging from dumpsters

behind fast-food restaurants,

gasping for scarce

unpeopled 

space

*  *  *

On this sullen night,

a billion stars 

&

a wounded creature

intersect

with a race whose quest for comfort

has gutted the eloquent balance

The moment convulses 

I shudder with the inconvenience

of him,

The carcass will smell,

I stamp! I yell!

He flattens against the wall

then hobbles away

down

the fire-escape

It is better that way

I return to my

news

sports

music

the art of edited attention

and modulated passions

too numb to fathom 

the epic language

That is no longer spoken here…