DOUBLE-DEALING

Orion, the Pleiades, all red dirt in the end.

The story of our lives,

                                       so short, so analogous,

Spreads open, empty, silent,

No matter what clothes we put on.

                                                             As twilight tightens, air

Fills the air. I’m still here.

It is, after all, about darkness.

Something’s creeping my batteries, though,

Something in long, black duds, down there to the left of me.

And here it comes, so anxious, so all-encompassing.

Its flash cards say me.

                                      All of its other cards say you.