The gutters of Paris,
my bed, while around me,
the artists, loud in their rooms,
all through the night,
demanding their freedom,
produce nothing.

The great and terrible weight
of nothing, like dew
causing a blade to bow,
bends us all in our place
and will not resolve us.

So why must I waken
to music's sterility,
the fights and the talks,
when all that's produced
is desperation, a broadcast
of scars, silent whiteness
beamed as a signal, a band
of oblivion that deafens.
Why must I waken to the smoke
of extinguished flames, the cries
of fire in empty movie theaters?

Shut down the stillborn cafe,
filled to unbreathing
with failures, and bluster,
and a longing that breaks
curfews, or bottles,
or hearts for no reason,
for a reason that's lost to us
whose shape we mouth when we move,
as we grope blindly to the papers
of the gutter, to scorch the fields
that could welcome us
if we would just silence
the screams we mistakenly
take for song..