Those Of You Who Came Late This Is An Animal Trap If You’re Loud Enough By The End Of The Show I Will Stick My Hand In It

i imagine the trees have all become bones
on the far side of the country,
but here in the western world
seasons turn slower than red rotisserie hens
strung up overnight, pale and lethargic
in the butcher’s finger-printed window—

november skies are stained as painter’s pants
as the inevitable, obscured collective sadness
of the approaching holidays
circles around us like an old dog,
waiting to snuggle down with the fresh batch of fog
creeping under the bridge
like nobody is checking anymore

but every one of our leaves will hold,
white stems of the bougainvillea
will continue to spill from the balconies,
blooming like diminutive constellations
and we’re left
to conceive our own gestures of winter