MUCH TO LEARN AT NIGHT
The crickets and the hemlocks were not the only night singers
Nor were they the only structures of the night; there were
Structured trees, a vaulted dome of stars and us as lovers.
The night also owns the rumbling of train cars over miles of
Desert track and the howling of coyotes circling cylindrical
Limestone caves and undersea eels poking their heads out.
Consciousness tends to sleep at night but there are yogis and
Yoginis who are always awake. Someone has to watch the things
That no one else saw and all that tends to hide under rocks.
During the day they are always below the threshold of our
Consciousness, those tidy desolate pariahs who belong to the
Nights are relegated t o the assumption of a flushed toilet.
They may lie on city steam grates, under bridges or just behind
Cardboard hovels. For them it is eternal night even under the
Glare of mercury vapor lamps assisting night drivers going home.
The night gave us a spectacle display of the bombing of Iraq resembling
Our Fourth of July celebration of bombs bursting in air. There is much
To learn from the night from furry animals struggling with darkness.