In which we word aloud.

 
   Night:   histrionics now history, glitter deglitzed, this should-be-tuckered self
   sought not to be snuggly tucked, but instead avoided bed with a jaunt. Wanting
   to relieve/release/remedy a certain restlessness,
   Magical Thrift Store Cowboy Boots (MADE IN TEXAS) clop atop
   rainwashed sidewalks, gold in the bright light of the wealthy shopping glow—

   no stopping, go. Lungs slurping up the evening fresh o're
   The Almost Lonely Promenade, empty but for the clopping
   of the Magical Thrift Store Cowboy Boots (MADE IN TEXAS)
   and the tut-tut tittering (not yet twittering) of The Snazzily Clad Octogenarians
   emerging from the no-longer bellowing belly of the Opera.

   This-- this is nice.
   Yes, please paint my flesh with this air, this fresh, this deliciously exhaled
   sigh. Sit me down awhile aside this canal, filled to its seagull-spotted brim with dark
   ripple sparkles, arching their backs over the black before rejoining its deepness.
   This water sings like an accordion. No, wait-- the water brings the accordion, carefully

   carrying its melancholy musings from the hands of the Musician across the way--
   too old for this cold, empty hat overturned on the ground instead of warming
   itself with the fullness of his hairless noggin. His body is framed perfectly twixt
   waves of white arches.
   Opening this heart as it lurks in the shadows, it pulls in the song

   of arthritic fingers, pulls in the wind
   whipping flags above as they jangle their poles in protest, pulls close
   the sound of sleeping gulls, heads tucked
   under wings, swathed
   in the feathery silence beneath.

   Pretty sure I saw this scene
   in a movie somewhere.
   Seven stars wink their tiny
   selves above green spires and golden ships.
   They've seen it, too. Can't remember how it ends.

   Knees unbent, anchor pulled, this body shakes off shadows, drying off
   their dark drops with the breeze. Clop.
   Magical Thrift Store Cowboy Boots (MADE IN TEXAS) call out to bare
   ears as they make their way by the water, wander bridges and pause
   at the mouth of the tunnel glow, the player the pinpoint

   of this echoing perspective. Clop. The accordion hands groan more beautifully
   to the hard sound of heels on stone. No one else
   has walked these ways for fifteen minutes-- I know.
   I was there as you played to the shadows, I was a shadow as you played to the night.
   Tension builds as the clopping approaches, fingers flying now, notes careening

   toward me with cupped hands outstretched--
   the clopping veers reassuringly, laugh lines crinkle, an empty
   hat finds itself a friend.
   Knees unbend, lifted by finger wings. Thank you.
   No, thank you. And I am blessed.

   It fills me as I descend into the earth, this blessing--
   granting a grateful weariness, lulling me, tuckered
   and tucked, to that sleep that is mostly dreamed of.
   It sounds like an accordion, far away in the night, fading
   to feathery silence. I join the gulls.

Sometimes I really miss my mother tongue.

Sing it, Etta.