The Light

They go to the park in the mornings after
life changing milestones.
The spotlight on the roof of the club
punctured the sky the night before,
and made some owls break their necks
on the trunks of local trees.

We are on our knees taking orders from
the order takers, while the undertakers
make us comfortable enough to say
goodbye. They don’t ask her why when
she tells them she’s over prescribed.
She says to buy more just
go out the back then to the side.

She sits under the porch light, smoking
like a dying fire, and knocks moths out of
the air with an old pipe. The blows rarely
killed them they just mostly knocked them
to the wooden boards of the deck where
they would nervously flutter their wings until
they were flying again. This did nothing to
persuade them that the light was not their
destiny, and they kept on coming back
night after night.