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The Nocturne of Highway Drifters
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Antiquated Cat's eye streetlights--
The orange vigil from sundown
To sunrise--
Glare through car windows
Empty fields
Hotel curtains, half-drawn
Sleepless faces are
The midnight rush
Top speed to somewhere
Thrill of insomnia.
Below:
Race of inconstant light,
Above:
The highway cosmos--
Stars hanging from iron poles
Wandering by till dawn
Red-eyed travelers
Chase shadows down the straight-backed road
Keeping time
In the nocturne of highway drifters
Gravel-voiced engines
And echoes into
The unknown, past the edges
Of the window
Red-faced clock
Counts the hours till it's needed
Indifferent in the darkness
A shadow bends in the mirror
Hunched at the window sill
And overhead, streetlights stare
Scattered in their moonless midnight
Branding crosses on the finger-printed glass
They are
Angels in the mirror
Perched at a shadowed shoulder
Whispering the watcher's wisdom
To the idle mind
Writing poetry on the late night wayside.
