defiant traffic
my nervous circuitry
reads aloud.
the luck of black crickets
chirping for pay
in the smallest of hours

in my ambulant walk
night goes off,
safety engaged,
cautiously out of
the crosshairs of her kindness.

we never went to India,
never snaked across sheets.
laboring in the seconds
just before knowledge,
and its textbook betrayal

I dig into my pocket
fumbling to discover
a swatch of musky silk
the cool leather of a rose petal
some proof…

I find forty-eight cents.

© Tom Watters 12/2/08