and just like that,
i’m a father again.

strange.
this modern love.
peering out the hospital window.
blue blankets, above
cotton-candy cumulus
in pink whispers.

you don’t really hold these things, do you? —

beauty.

but they’re undeniable.

even in the beartrap,
looking at the same sky you were—
a penitence all its own,
they’re the heavens
for all i know—

but there it was.

-

and tomorrow they’ll burst,
pour down the spouted nimbus,
pit-pattering jazz
on the hood of my car,
while i ugly-cry

as prayer turns to plee.

-

I’m present now,
goddammit,
even if crushed by the snapping steel,
teeth sinking-in where hope gave out,

and the pain demanding it—
even from my fingers—
when the doc said,
”six months to live.”

but with those same fingers,
i flipped a coin,
typed new life,
placed my two hands together,
and prayed,

and in reward,
god gave the breast
to my newborn,
and my wife cried
for joy.

-

you see, the place i was headed
was closed, but it didn’t matter now,

for I saw the city in rainbow
tears flocked in prism—
clouds scattered like deviant teens.

sirens broke through in caterwaul,
calamity,
good-god, forget the taste of gin,
for the railroad cars are click-clacking over the bridge,
passing on their heaving rhythms,
a train song.

-

a calm came over me,
for these same heavens
will wrap us in blankets—
forgive us all:

for cursing,
for goodbyes,
and almost ending a life.

-

the heavens spoke to me in that moment:

“you’re nothing, forever boy,
but a train song.”