spent the night looking at streetlights…a yellowish hue shining down on flat black where parked cars on cement blocks wait for burial…stripped Pontiacs and broken Buicks missing pieces…an old Ford Fairmont with shattered windows and broken mirrors…pickup trucks with flat tires…a gypsy cab drives by…

and voices shout ‘cross the alley-way as cats cringe…an old chained dog barks…wanting badly to bite…rats scurry along for another round of scraps from a Chinese restaurant…opossum waits in hiding…

I sit and listen…sirens yell out…winds curse and chatter…watching red taillights blink quickly at stop signs…glance both ways…a muffler drags…

wooden gates with latches never to be locked swing in the night…they mumble and hiccup…like a drunk on a Tuesday afternoon…wandering home to a flee bit flophouse bed…brown bag on the nightstand beside him…tomorrow’s a new day…

spent the night looking at streetlights…