The Progress of Night

In the late elegiac light, insects
      chide the frail contraption of the sky,
            its faulty system of pulleys and wires.

Piteous stars circuit the stripped gears
      of galaxy as crickets keep grinding
            out twilight's tinny, dwindling music.

Again that pale immigrant blunders in
      to watch over the progress of night,
            to observe the grim magics we practice,

all the oaths we take and make and utter.
      What comfort can we offer another
            traveler under this same unsteady scaffold?

We'll find no charm against calamity.
      Though the dark architecture of the heart
            is buttressed by sternum, girded by ribs,

we build our lives from its very trembling.

Copyright © 2004 Amy Fleury All rights reserved
from Beautiful Trouble
Southern Illinois University Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission