Searching for Symbols in a Town Without a River

I begin the day buying yogurt in a small

favorite grocery store. The clerk

a man of few pretenses was making jokes

about his wife, how they fight in bed.

Discovering the better stores in the community.

In a given day, isolated from friends,

I speak to few people. An old woman

asks me for directions to the post office

or I speak to a stranger over the phone about night work.

At home my every thought comes to the counterpoint of a dream:

a girl I love surprises me by knocking on the window.

I ply my arts all day alone.

After this silence like being hidden away in the woods

in a cabin, bored

but owing no member of society an explanation,

invitation to a party. A flow of wine and devilish drugs

and quickly I am making a fool of myself.

My new friends like me

but when they think about me at all,

they wonder.

                    Wandering home

through the midnight air, alone again,

free, admiring

the ghostly houses of my new neighbors

by new moonlight.