The Loss of a Muse

The Loss of a Muse

By night, the mother tongue
Whips, licks errant words into shape

Words curl and uncurl
like a cat
Afraid to be spoken

By night, the mother tongue slurs
remembers
empty streets
bootlegged bottles in cars
that flirt with speed and boundaries

hands that hover between love and lust
as sleeping skylines watch
by night

the mother tongue
coils around secrets
that only highways can tell
not homes, not destinations.

By night
I make a heap of unsaid words
in my mother tongue
and scatter them on the breeze
untamed
to pour indiscretions in your ear, your bones
graze the unshaven weekend on your chin

and spawn a mongrel poem.