Clear Night | tonight

Clear Night

Quinn Gruber

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tonight

Leah Wang

clear night
tonight
matte ink sky spread out full against
hard glean of the stars
or city lights
too hard to tell apart 

or perhaps it is i
my eyes too used to adjusting to the bright 

i 
am part of the city now
no longer of suburban green silence
or one with the smell of concrete after the rural rains of our chinese village

clear night
bright lights
how much room is left in this unclouded sky
for my tacky sentimentality?
how much of it is left in me?

little kid she would balk to see
what i’ve grown into
turtle shell heart
sharp teeth when i speak
and when was the last time i wrote poetry?

instead i trade
the sweet rhythm of words for 
the hot hard burn of coffee beans and computer keys
for anxiety

gave back my dreams
watched them dissolve into the clouds of my hometown
and there are no clouds now
pushed out by the hard glean of the stars
or city lights
no point now in telling them apart