The Lights

On nights like this,

When I look out the window

And see a street light go out,

See the powerful dark consume the pale protestation,

I fall into myself,

Tumbling through, not darkness,

But absence so great as to press into my chest

Like a wall with no portrait hanged,

But its absence felt for the nail.

And I keep falling and forget I’m falling

And forget the absence and maybe myself.

I must be something, as is everything else,

Surely. I remember broken hearts

And fat afternoons in the dim sweet light of good sex,

The sharp stabs of adolescent fears

In the face of the unknown.

Surely only those who are remember that.

But I never know for sure

Until the light turns back on.