Literature
Until the Lamplighters
plays and subway cars lurch to a standstill we gather our wits up and methodize and fill our hands with the power they say we can’t handle we vandals and Visigoths wielding our candles ‘til the generators should wake from their slumber| as Broadway casts, acrobats all do a number on the streets set to crumble beneath them with all of the weight of their great ancient feeling like blind tightrope walkers who feel their way forward their bravado follows me up through the gutters and I’ll trail them, listless until the lamplighters come by to help us trim the wicks on the lanterns we keep in our pockets in case we should need them (though just now we haven’t provision to feed them) we’ll sit here carousing by the light of their oil their conflict minerals, immortal coils well, I call that progress I’ll drink if I need to I’ll pay you back later I promise, I’ve got you and just for a minute we’re all trapeze artists affixed at the wrists in mid-air—I won’t drop you a line after