The Nightwatchman

The Nightwatchman

The nightwatchman creases the collar to 

his coat, bleary-eyed and dreaming on

his way into the morning fog. Too tired

to curse, he sighs at the overnight frost 

on his windshield. Too lazy to scrape,

he sits behind the wheel, going nowhere,

counting his remaining black whiskers 

in the rearview mirror.

First shift pickups trickle into the lot. 

Through frosted view he senses 

the fluid precision of motion, and the

random curls of smoke awaiting dissipation.

Monomaniacal salesmen press 

beyond the precipice

marked “No Solicitation.” In younger days

he’d have run them off the lot, but

his vision is blurred and his gait is slow and

his heart is empty of that fire.

He has just enough reserves to fight the

daily upstream battle 

against morning’s rush hour commute.

He dreams of home, and cold sheets and

echoes of empty hallways and the

dull pain of daylight’s darker side.

Easier on this morning 

to bury the broken tail-light

and the bumper

and the faded brown trunk and the exhaust

into the snow-bank and

wait for the passing of dawn.