To sunlight and on walls

If you don't already know
why streets are like fresh-baked bread,
why old men play cards in the park,
on benches pulled together,
why a fallen tree waits for evening,

if you don't already know
the bandstand that enfolds a summer,
the cigarette that burns a journey,
silver rain that falls from the sun
to the ocean under a pier,

the heartbeat of concrete will never batter you,
the parchment of dried leaves will fall silent,
small birds will forget to sing,
and streams will not spring from stone.

Unless you pray to walls with light
and chant a hymn for morning traffic,
unless you shoulder up the clouds
and become the race of underground rivers,

you'll never see ascending to the sun
where no street was, a white wide street,
no row of houses will ever stand
transfigured into song,

and no train will bear you backwards dreaming
till you wake to some other voice,
other eyes, another
time, knowing
nothing.

--
Stephen Moran

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