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 prayers 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 told you,
”six months to live.”

but with those same fingers,
we type new life,
placing two hands together,
we 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 doesn’t matter now,

for I saw the city in rainbow
tears flocking in prism—
as clouds scatter like deviant teens.

sirens breaking through in caterwaul,
a calamity,
good-god, forget the taste of gin,
as the railroad cars click-clack 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 tiny life.

-

the heavens spoke to me in that moment:

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