In March, we set aside time
for the rain. The streets become
silvery sheets burnished
in duplicating glass.
None walk them, and only
the carriage man (a broad, spindly
fellow whose copious midriff
seems the bulging stuff
of planets) dares drive.
In secret places, there are many caricatures:
flown away hair framing the face
of an angry mother, her lips curled,
fist drawn, figure whorled to a vortex.
Yellowed, her frame rests
beside the businessman,
the fireman, the insurance salesman,
and the wall.
Children know me as
dust shifting in corners; wind searing
the bricks in the alley.
Truthfully, I am neither of those things.
(I am more than them.)
Summers I hang by my toes from
the highest balcony for miles;
the wind robs me of time, life, and purity.
Peddlers exchange those things
for the coins in
a young boy's pocket. No one
cares for them.
Not I, especially.
Last week I saw an old man
crying in the sideways, his eyes made heavy
by the weight of much living.
He wore a brown hat
(like a hunter) and a cloak of
the same color. For many hours
I watched him. He did not move—
and it seems in retrospect
that I might have recognized him,
but I didn't know it
at the time.
My father and the rusted light raining in a small space upon various objects arranged to resemble windows, cars, and stairways
Kyle Muntz is the author of Voices (Enigmatic Ink, 2010), Sunshine in the Valley (Civil Coping Mechanisms, 2011), and VII (forthcoming, Enigmatic Ink, 2012).