Closer Than They Appear
Beyond this floor-to-ceiling glass,
blue dusk—waterfall coursing my limbs,
dousing me in its paternal rage—
airtight window, you cannot hear
the screeching streams,
the teething trees scratching the wind,
outstretching
brittle branches to the moon’s dribbling milk—
a father reunites with his son
after a decade apart—
whispers piercing porcelain plates—soup steam
rising upwards, apparition
here to warn us
of the pitiless depths—
of our newborn skulls—
of the way the lamps in the restaurant dimmed as
our futures waned &
dusk drifted into night,
that blue light here for those spare seconds
scavenged into sapphire—
we are the last table—
the cerulean neon
burnished the pavement, echoed
in the puddles—
the falls deafening, devouring
the bones that hold us,
those adrift hitchhikers—
strangers to Chevys sliding
across slicked highways—
seeing in every rain-specked windshield
the faces of our mother & father—
waiting ceaselessly for
them to slow to a stop & flick their blinkers,
gazing at us in the foggy rearview
mirrors, slowly nearing
their sealed doors, reddening ears peeled for
the divine click of the lock
Brennan Sprague studies creative writing at MCC.