the night swoons like a bitter lover, half drunk and restless, roaming and kicking up dirt with shoes scuffed from a day’s shuffle of clouds and children. we were all meant to be like this: desperate and angry, having lost tin cans draped over telephone wire, laces tied behind our backs, and a tuft of hair tucked behind our ears. feathers locked within the links of a steely fence and we pine the folds between the neck and the collarbone. how grand the pock marked moon scratched atop trees with fingers withered empty.