He exhales,
Seated at the patio table,
Musing on the eddies of his smoke.
In idleness he snuffs out the light of another cigarette
And measures his ashes before shuffling into the house to find the kitchen.
Just as he left it.
His hand flickers toward the black coffeepot
Of the early morning.
It is this lull before dawn that he chases
With all the sleeping fury of dreams,
And so turns the wheel of the day.
He may scowl at the clock,
Though some days he does not bother to look,
Or else he forgets.

Someone ought to tell him that the deserts are growing
By the minute, vast and full of sand—
Or that there is no terminus for the listing boat
That sails without helm beyond the horizon’s glittering mirage
On hulking oceans of devoured glaciers—
Or that the reaper’s scythe comes full circle once
And for all.

Children may spend years in a periphery,
Eyeing floorboards voiceless, floating like wisps up staircases,
Obscuring themselves in a hide-and-seek game of love,
Scouring the walls for answers to questions unasked,
That should have been.
I sent him a message before he passed, as he lay still:
“I hope this message reaches you,” it ended;
Words lost in a vacuum.
The thing about hope, he would have said,
Is that it makes a better door
Than a window.