the painted sky fell everywhere and when
the paralytic world of what we were
went melting into indomethacin
the blindness of the mere demographer

who sees not what the lonely one can see
the hounding of the guiltless parolee
the wife who fears her husband won’t come home
because of wanton hate of shade and tone

the mind expands, the blanket slips away
the sober man turns up for what and who
forgetting what no purposing can do
upon the phalanx spun from bastille day

the painted sky fell everywhere, decreased,
you asked me to just hear you once, at least