12 hours

heat slaughtered sleep

awake after the sun set

unrefreshed and restless

to wander down dark

suburban streets

where the sensors

turn on the lights

as i pass the driveways

or the manicured walks

is that a mulberry or a maple?

the gleam of clean washed paint

on the muscular flanks of trucks

and the distant distant sound

of hank williams singing

about lonesome whistles

the loop closed, back home

and barefoot after midnight

watching the dark interior

worlds of the brothers quay

a break, a cigarette while

standing on the warm concrete

of the sidewalk in front of the house

cooling now, all the windows

in the neighborhood are open

and the sounds flow out

an ancient tv comedy

with silly voices interrupted 

by the sound of audience

laughing and somewhere

across the street a woman

seems to be enjoying sex

quite a lot and the hum of

swimming pool equipment

lies beneath the song of crickets

the fevered weather may have

cracked last night, there was

a narrow fog across the bay

a grayness lightening to white

a return to the usual, perhaps?

the routine cycle of rising and falling

the prison bus with it's white mesh

window screens hiding the men inside

until they step out to file into the building

around the corner, wrists attached

by slender chains to the one

around their waists. swallowed up

for processing. back across the borders.

for now. they'll be back to wash the dishes.