THE NIGHT

The night, that dark and rancid cloak,

contains within its half-drawn claws

a certainty I cannot match,

nor merely approach; my fear prevents

such posturing.

 

Darkness wants for nothing,

save my peerless pride

that so often burns down to hubris

and faithless self-promises

written distractedly in flowing water.

 

Now I rarely leave my house

(the fallen leaves of April

commend me) Not,

you understand, under fiat;

but to scrawl my signature

across a blue dome of sky.

 

I allow that this too will melt away;

like chromium in a blast furnace

or my own simulacrum,

it will have met its match.

 

Chris Hubbard

2020