The sanguine light over Puget Sound
rises to undress the restless soul
of November, while I open my front door,
a shadow still grazing on the dust
of midnight dreams, and slip into the day
unnoticed. The street is long, narrow,
a cobblestone place-setting for the stir
of nomadic echoes, and I am, at once,
a child again; flush with anticipation,
daunted by uncertainty, I walk as I have
always walked, white-laced, empty-handed;
this steel gray dawn hanging by the tattered
threads of windswept clouds.

Along the waterfront the face of afternoon
drifts quietly, its eyes marking the path
its body will soon reach; so I sit,
hungry for its promise to land
upon my shoulders, and wait; content
to remain in the sobering embrace
of an indifferent breeze, while slivers
of blue glass break over my fingers,
and rigid, ocher sands, whisper and moan
under my shifting weight; standing,
withdrawing, only when the mountains,
perched high and leaning, are lost
behind shrouds of salted mist.

Dusk seeps in from every corner, the resin
of its pallid fingers drawing dark curtains
around the shoulders of tall, pale-faced
buildings. Streetlights blink to life,
harried voices, shuffling feet, skip
across the pavement, beleaguered tokens
of another day, and I move effortlessly,
until the clarity of night pending is stained
by the rueful smile of a friendship
that could have been, a friendship that will
never be, and I am, at once, a child again;
flush with anticipation, daunted by uncertainty,
I nod, then wander off, a friend unto myself.