Hooks

And all the poems in my brain
are slipping
too sloppy
too floppy
ultimately too ugly
to adorn your pretty eyes here
the inverse of the type face
I see as you are
staring into
my soul!

They're here
melting sticky gum
thunderstorms
rainstorms
coughs and sniffles
shuffles feet
scoot scoot of chair
kids smoking cigarettes after hours
rustling of paper in a quiet room
full of people
acquaintances.

There's the black dance of birds
in the black windows, reflecting
a beautiful blue sky
just a horizon for the
dirty black pavement
mirrored twins walk along side
you stare,
they stare,
into the windows
of the ABC stores
and the blaring safety lights
and the night seems young, but
it has seen too much
too much already, for its age
but there is no sense in dieing.

It's the seasonal shift
a chemical shift
a birth of blue jeans
and scattered around
there's leaves
where there were none before.
Aye, but you hear it.
The beginning.