ISSUE: Winter 1991
These evening hours of blank heat I feel
utterly alone, until the air ripples a bit
and I think of everyone luxuriating in its
gift
at once, like a congregation. I live, after all,
in town, on a quiet street, in a building
of thirty apartments and at least
as many people, dulled like me, half-
dressed,
idling near open windows or on landings.
The breeze with its vetch-and-dust scent
touches us all and then departs; how can
we
not turn our faces away
from the screens, and discount it?
