there is only the sound

John Sweet

at some point it becomes 2:00 a.m. february moves into march and i drink the faucets dry pace from room to room while my wife dreams of the man she loves and i am not drunk but tired beyond sleep and in every window in every house on this street a tiny candle burns each one a silent benediction but the starving can't eat these empty gestures the bleeding have no use for poetry eventually there is only the sound of the dead being slowly forgotten