great aunt & uncle

A cigarette before takeout pizza and stale beer on 
city sidewalks against dirty windows at 4:09. 
The hallway walls trip into open spaces with tin ceilings
that shine down warped faces of real-time regulars layered
over older void recordings of vacuous figures on
musty grease carpets, dirt and drunk on sleep haze of neon
glass inside shiny plastic bars that reek of crisping meat 
and flat diet pepsi, 

The nicer ones keep their cognac in mahogany stools 
wrapped in metals that scream against their pinched and polished wood,
features hidden in murky shadows of half-light.
When there is no room left to breath fresh air between frantic 
scuffles of desperate attempts in the dark, the dream begins
in the sunlight. fitful and unsatisfied, breathing in 
smoke under an eternity of roundabout cycles
of dim yellow bulbs.