Nobody Knows

We had to imagine you even then, Ramon, your star lost,

a glimpse to die for,

all the kids galloping to Westside Park

where your gang was supposed to meet in open warfare

those bitter skinny boys from Toonerville,

well-armed, Lupe said.

And when we got there, nothing, no armies, no chucos

with long tails and zip guns, just the grass

with its stunned look, as though it never really wanted all that light.

City grass doesn't want much of anything,

it's not out there trembling with desire,

minds its own business, leeching slowly upward from busted pipe.

And now nobody knows what you really wanted, Ramon,

when the needle spun true north,

or why that final rush of light, flat stare of lawn

as you staggered by, seared your own throat shut.

Tonight, I'm getting to the smallest place I know,

dusk coming on slow,

the moon half full of shade,

so still it almost doesn't want to move,

whispers a phrase to particles of blue.

Same moon you knew with its white mind watching,

same moon you walked beneath and were gone.

Source: Antidote for Night (BOA Editions Ltd., 2015)