Morning found us patronized,
 morning found us dying;
 garish, the fuse that bloomed in the
 wavering of your eyes,
and cauterized the love that turned
 the casket from your door.

 Lantern-man, his fevered light
 pendulums through the cordoned streets;
 sprawled, the watch-fires grow and
 roll like tumbleweeds to heaven.

 Windows beckon, no one dares
 answer the silent cry of their amazement;
 houses travel upward
 or downward in the flames,
 singeing alien passersby who
 huddle their prospects forward
 in a tourniquet of smoke.

 Life grows ever-more-fledgling,
 crackling down like timber.
 I have died
 too many times already in the
 throes of your waning patience,
 and those who, unloving,
 gesture and plan their royal designs
 in temples far removed from
 the trial and the terror,
 close their padded cells,
 while complacency draws its severed blinds
 over the songs of mourning.