In the Village you get the tang of dead pennies and vinyl
spinning on your Bourbon tongue
and everything’s ***** Roscoe with the jump kids
on Broad Street and the Blacks
polishing rimshots off of stars they can’t see.
Hubcaps vanish like wallets at a crosswalk-
and the rain smells like iron
binging Detroit with fume Kabuki
as falafels alight upon the caverns of asphalt
like a flock of agnostic Finch
migrating to the Temple
of your Migraine.

She’s gone now and nothing can stop you
from becoming a ghost, unless your letters
were never written on purpose
and your absence was the
Plan.

The Jungle is a
stainless steel fog
of Blown Cover
in a war on the
Senseless.

You can’t catch
a Breath
without Catching
Hell
in the Bargain
with a Devil
You Know-

Will Leave.