Discovering Fire
we will all
spend half our lives
in some darkness or another.
some of us become so used to it —
sleeping, dying, sobbing alone behind
drawn curtains — that we
fail to recognize light.
from time to time
we pack up our cigarettes, our worrisome
habits and addictions, and go outside.
there, we pretend to understand the sudden
moonlight. we do not know that
we know nothing, that
everything we can see
is silhouette, shadow puppet, stick figure.
the streetlamps do little for us.
walls, roads, sidewalks, lawns seem grey and
smooth, a blur of sameness,
the contrast turned down.
we’ve got a long time to wait before we get used to this.
listen:
if you get to the edge of the neighborhood
before the rest of us, send some sort of signal back:
a sound maybe, or a scent; better yet,
something brighter than twilight,
something that will let us know
you’ve gotten there,
that will let us know
how far we’ve got to go
before we get to where
we can see what you can.
holler back if you don’t get lost,
or even if you do.
Dark Matter 