The slick rooftops still hold a shine
when the air admits no light,
leaving an aura of haze around the chimneys.
But then their faces stand against the sky all day
absorbing the light unconsciously.
Below the roof I lie
and the rain comes, tapping on the window
like a friend who expects easy entry
but I will not let her in,
nor can she see me
covered in the bedclothes
and the night.
In the day the rain won鈥檛 stop to see how I run
on my own playing fields,
where child voices
fly up like paper quickly burnt.
There she is,
I tell the nearby houses whose staring windows
capture only the blur of me moving.
I have outrun the first and coldest wind.
The sky I flew quickly by
receives the last angry parts of me;
I call to them, now pages of ash,
but they do not turn, not even in their sleep.
