Ear to the Night

I press my hand to your sleep.

Then I find your spent head under small
whirling tresses

having digested the clatter
of car horns, children

bustling into sweet shops.

This might be
the gift of a street:

drumming Saturdays and a Monday palm of heart.

I’ve learned that yours
is the chorus of breathing,

a rhythm, forgiving,

that nuzzles the margin within my nature’s cratered sigh.

Once, I felt the feet
of a canyon collapse within you.

Then I come to eyes,
heavy with the tumble of night dew

having collected verdigris
off the entrance gate.

Never mind the umbrella
you lost on the subway tracks.

The head is an iron jar filled with many swiveling hours.

All day, I listened,
a city carved

from the hollows of a wire woven shell.