Angeline
he had been without her
in the empty hotel bed for
two nights, two sweating
quiet blacknesses, without
shuffling or snores, or jittery
leg kicking; now all he wanted
was for the moon to leave him
alone and the neon outside in
the street to bury itself in the
deathly still of the tree lined
park, where the rats and weasels
and crazy cats foraged in their
merry hunt for things left over,
while the night, that trickster of
the seasons, rested in his eyes:
when he had first visited the city,
with its girls and bars and hot,
humid evenings he was full:
now he heard only the sounds of
angry crickets, drowning amid
the craters of the dying wounded
as he stumbled drunk past the
bed, the bath and the TV; would
this last patrol always be here?
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