I Bespeak

I have been driving these city streets

with a bottle of whiskey, a pack
of cigarettes and an urge to answer
a rhetorical question.
I am halfway through my Windsor heating
element. I am smoking stogues in sets of
two, with the windows rolled up. Its great down
here. Imagine: up is up and the reverse is impossible.
This city looks different when its frigid.
This city looks different when your insides
are being simultaneously warmed and torn apart
at the same time. No chaser.
I inhale, swig, hold, release.
Harden my arteries.
Blacken my lungs.
Moon roof release, not to breathe,
but to see the stars and the clouds
and my breath. Smoke and water vapor.
Its beautiful.
If I could blow a fuse or a circuit breaker or a generator or a power plant and
see these streets sheathed in black I would freeze.
Find a bench to lay on and drink my drink, smoke
my smoke, eyes aimed towards the heavens.
And breathe.
And breathe.
And freeze.
This city would look different if we put out the lights.
This city would look beautiful if we put out the lights.
This city would look dead if we put out the lights.
Ive the windows down. Down the hatch. Hatch a plan.
Hatch an easel. Paint it black then paint it white.
What they don't know won't hurt them
or do them any good. Its like it never happened.
I need another cigarette.
And another belt.
All means of communication are kaput.
I'm downing telephone poles and flicking my
cigarette butts into newspaper vending machines.
I don't want to know what happened tonight.
I don't really give two shits about the shit
I have missed.
I couldn't care less about whatever it is that
people are saying.
All I care about
at this moment in time
is getting drunk,
staying whiskey warm,
and getting you fuckers to out the lights.