Tonight I miss America
at night.
Tonight I miss tambourines and harmonicas.
I miss the low whistle
of a train through the dark.
I miss fog-soggy sidewalks
and boys with stubbly beards
smoking cigarettes,
windshield shards
glittering beneath their sneakers
like that:
stars.
I miss driving home—
Bay Bridge jaundice,
hungry tunnel howling,
ears ringing
and headlights
like a lonesome pair of eyes.
I missed cracked windows
and cup holders,
the arch of 580
to 24,
the moment before
the highways touch
And I miss that city
laid out beneath me
and glittering
For one still moment
Like that
Like how I miss that—
Something I could almost touch
At night.
Tonight I’ve got the jungle.
Tonight I’ve got
Cambodia’s muggy black
of birds crying and geckos belching,
the low drone of insects
trying to get in.
Tonight I’ve got the world
behind a mosquito net
and the sea somewhere—
I can hear it.
I’ve got sheets and the shape
of some still body;
I’ve got a lonesome pair of eyes
probing in the dark
and all the goddamn stars in the world,
glittering like that
Naked like that
Like how I’ve always been—
Splayed and waiting
And breathing in the dark.
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