Two Octets (Burnside & Broadway)

burnside st octet


two paper plates discarded in wet grass,
sodden; a paper cup too, & an orange

shattered graffiti across curved window shards;
posters, out-of-date anyway, under masking tape—

after yesterday’s rains brown maples leaves
melt into pavement near the one paper bag—

one pigeon descends to the stoplight array:
the rooftop flock basks in unexpected sun


◦    ◦    ◦


broadway st octet

red columns beside the Chinese restaurant’s
open glass doors, one bowed right recalling

a tree bending toward light—two empty tables
outside the noodle house under black shingled

overhang, but after all the hazy sun
inches past the meridian behind it,

fluttering ghosts of last summer’s cabbage whites—
how fallen leaves radiate in shifting wind!


Jack Hayes
© 2016



 
11/6/16 & 11/9/16