Here’s to the rubble: starlight starts to grow quietly. The world comes to chaos so quietly.   Gravity promised to give up for a minute if we told it the things we know, quietly,   so we let foggy breath bleed into cold air and excuses ring frantic, though quietly.   Today, a river we’ve…

In Arkansas, five thousand blackbirds fall on New Year’s Eve, pepper kernels crunching up pavement. The street-sweeper parks and stares.  Does not know who to call.  The corpses are cleared but they keep missing spots, like when mother paid me to pluck out her grays—celestial casualties left for the neighbor boy to shovel away.  I…

Last night I caught you sleepwalking again: you stumbled to the hallway and curled your toes against the hardwood, spun like the skipping track of a cross-eyed orbit.  I had forgotten what you look like off-balance. Your nightmares only ring true in retrospect, if you remember the falling. But last night I watched you lurch…