Untitled

Somewhere warm
other people
we once will one day be
or could have one day been
sip whiskey and joe

but here beneath the
edges of stars
at the end of lines
the earth is stabbed
with brittle years

and old words
I have rubbed
thin and quick with spark.

The days are ripe
with flailing
and the sound that
open-end wrenches make
when cast
against the long block.

I have been mistaken
for a man
who never
rubbed his fingers
down to blood
for fire,

or tasted the pulp
of his own teeth.

Old friend Chicago
shrugs in anger

and lifts
torpedo cars
up off the rails.