South Side, Chicago, May 18

 

Then night bristles

and its pause bursts

into a symphony of crowbars

beating at the tinted glass.

Sounding as a nightingale,

The broadsided auto

starts its chorus of alarm.

 

Then the nocturnal journey

of your palm begins

its crawl along my breadth of thigh.

If the others in the room are resting,

we will make our bed in the tub,

and pull the tap over the noise

of our flushing.

 

Or, if they are not asleep

Then we will nest on the fire escape

and play with sounds adhering

to the sirens below, of battering

and browbeaters patrolling

the street.

 

But if you are exhausted,

sleep will floor you past lunchtime.

 In the afternoon, I will find

our cramped company at work,

tinkering with the intricacies

of machines: grinding gears,

threading cables.

 

To the five we have

accrued in these tight quarters,

I will complain the change

of seasons has passed, unnoticed

outside this building. Soon,

it will be too hot to leave.

 

But I must be patient, so

I unspool days with abandon;

un-letting them from

my nervous grasp

on a pilgrimage past

those punctured cars;

dodging puddles that have fallen

from their gaping windows.