Poem from circa 1995. I believe this is the first time posted.

This night of stars that have tunneled through the dark

has kept me up so much later than I should have been up.

A cloud across the moon fills my eyes with tears.

Watching the sun vanish opened up a night of dread.

I sat by the river fearing the dead approach of

this night of stars that have tunneled though the dark

and thrown a wink of infinity against my hope for closure.

I wish I knew who to call. I wish I knew what to say.

A cloud across the moon fills my eyes with tears.

If there were any distance to travel that would take me past the lights

to places where I could not see the open sky, I could say less of

this night of stars that have tunneled through the dark

and kept me up so much later than I should have been up.

In an hour the sun will rise but it cannot dim the memory that, like

a cloud across the moon, fills my eyes with tears.

Night, day, the cycle repeats with no hope of a change

until the day the fist of God slams down upon

this night of stars that have tunneled through the dark.

A cloud across the moon fills my eyes with tears.

I bite the inside of my mouth. Tastes
like rust, like the inside of a long-uncleaned
tank —old blood, more iron than liquid.

Then I take a picture of my wounded face
and imagine who I’d be if I had better skin,
if I had better eyes and better hair —

you ask, who decides
what better means? If I had the face of another man,
is what I mean by it. A face born in another time,
better suited to another time.

You say I don’t know
what I mean by that, that I look like a man
at rest in his era, but you can’t taste
my antique blood. You can’t understand
how mournful, how wistful that I was not born
in a day unlike our own I can become. How broken
my own face makes me feel.

Lastly, I take a sip of water.
Shake off the messy moment.
Step back into these blowback days.