All day the city went on being a city we traversed
as if it could be conquered by touch,
leaning against stone walls and wrapping our fingers
around rails overlooking the river.
And all through the city, the day went on being a day
blazing ruthlessly, even when it started to rain,
and the devil beat his daughter all afternoon
until sparrows stirred the cauldron of sky
and dusk doused the flames in greenish smoke.
That was more or less the recipe to make night,
when the city writes its unspendable wealth inside us.
When a pebble becomes a bright coin on the sidewalk,
where a black ermine scurries under a car
to replace motor oil rushing into the gutter.
And I become a bird squeezed in a boy's dirty palms
while you digest an iron egg of dread,
the empirical result whenever moonlight
takes shadow to be her lawfully wedded husband.
One's fate in this city is to come and become and be overcome.
In each of us a mad rabbit thrashes and a wolf pack howls.