published in Poetry Review 98:1 Spring 2008

Difficult Days

Difficult days, sweet sunshine,

everything stolen, even water,

nothing completed,

not bridges, kisses, deals.

Slow hours after noon, the heat

pools into darkened ferments.

Windows mesh the street:

bleached dust, a scarred sky,

the old road in ruts and hollows,

the pumps empty. Difficult days.

Over their filmy liquor, old men tell

how cold are nights in the desert.

Cold. The word sizzles

in hot skulls.

                           One of us

will be going out there soon,

plotting a course

by enormous stars.

Stella Davis

e-mail Stella

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