Reflection of a Road

The crescent moon of the eye's
white would not rise
but for the smell of fresh

tar, the creosote stink of a bridge
to a place of cuts,
the promise of confinement.

Nights in grasses,
in the trees, when the fight
is merely against the visits of persistent friends,

the insects, nights when bodies
rise or lie down according to their own laws
and dance without knowing why,

the black eye closed is penumbra,
dark as clean water.