A Dose of Dark October Afternoon

I crave a dose of dark October afternoon –
and right on cue penumbral mysteries accrue:
a yellow-gray-green shimmer coalesces into
soft-toward-evening brown: constrains and paints
the outdoor light and splays its theater ‘round
the purview that my third-floor view affords of this

strange-witted-winded city: anguished pleasure
ravages each tender fiber of the weave; it gives me
leave to think I might relieve the painful part of it,
dive deeper into some unspoken promise – whose
familiarity astonishes – its complex singularity,
its deeply shadowed face; I’ve found it in this

place, outside a balcony of inner sight from which
I lean to linger: pregnant with half-brightness –
windows outside, here, right here, precisely where
they ought to be, and are, for me. Manhattan skies
cry: ancient rain: I am concatenated in the chain:
a link. Nothing in this fading glow is out of sync.



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