72 Hours

The fridge was a choir of electric bees,

bringing the drywall down to its knees.

I walked out past the trash on the curb,

where the air is a thing you can almost disturb.

Under the I-95, the concrete is wide,

a place where the city has nothing to hide.

The rain stops to breathe, then starts up again,

smelling of iron and the fever of men.

A sodium lamp leaks a bruised, orange glow

on a puddle where the drainage is slow.

The water is twitching from a hole in the pipe,

while the rest of the world is heavy and ripe.