digital art: ralph murre
Nighthawk
by
Stephen Anderson
It’s
3 AM outside the 7-Eleven.
In
the distance, approaching car headlights
Dot
the blackness at this hour while
Inside
a scrawny twenty-something sits
Behind
the counter tracing a 9 mm under the
Counter
with his fingers, surrounded by four lonely
Walls
that contain items insomniacs seek
During
black hours like these. All the cars
Pass
silently except for one that booms by, its radio blasting—
A
rolling boom box that shatters the still,
Vapid
night air while the car’s occupants
Head
to nowhere good, to their rendezvous
With
the nothingness of this night rhythm
In
the key of absurd loneliness.
They
all seem to head toward what home
Might
be, the place where eyes will later
Strain
under desk lamp far into the night
Amid
silver ghosts that shimmer in the dark blue
Shadows
before sleep envelops them in a dream
Of
star-sent angels light years from Edward Hopper’s
Nighthawks,
while outside the night’s mist will soon start
To
evaporate, as it will again and again . . .
~ previously published in Brawler
