Do you remember the orange morning light
carpeting the corners of certain cracked sidewalks
near the end of October?

Do you remember the frost, like a sickness,
making the grass grayer?

Do you taste the soil that’s stained your skin
as your face drips a slow thaw to the pavement,
a stew of this planet and who you used to be?

Am I much more broken now than you are?

What colors do you see that draw you
from the dirt toward some new throat?

What skin hue would you not hew through
with your yellowing teeth?

What remains of those forgotten disturbances
you told no one about?

Do you, like those of us who remain,
blame the edges of things for what you are?

Do you curse the melted snow for the cold?

When you dream (Do you dream?),
do you forget your name like we do?

What color is your name as it walks
through the failing forests of your thoughts?

There are old dreams still dragging their feet
through my waking hours, their colors fading
as the clouds of the present come reaching in.

When you sleep (Do you sleep?) do you speak
to your shadows?

Do you try to eat them because anything
that tastes like night is your favorite flavor?

I wish I could wake you up,
so you could smell the air changing
when it’s dark and you’re alone, but you still feel
there’s a kind of light you can cough out of the cave
in your chest, one just bright enough
to illuminate your face as you look into
the mirror and, for the first time in a long time,
start to remember who you are.

Is my shadow today the same one I had yesterday?

Does rain hold, in its arms, the dying bird as it falls?