as shells purr through darkness tomcat black

my palms read the stone between blasts

     your letter folded twice over in my hip pocket

     worthy of pilgrimage through fated streets
the summer dark turned to glory

I crawl into the square		flames moon-high

a nation's books ignited

the library's roof splintering into the shy night

     as facades lean in with the solidarity of age

cannon fire makes mockery of faith

and men like molten insects draw water from Miljacka river

to spit and sigh with impotence

sirens beginning their birdless choir
you wait on the other side by your silenced phone

facing a courtyard ringed with cacti your grandmother tends with deftness

     not a drop shed

and I think of succulents   the prick of mishandled devotion

breathe deep then run	head down nape exposed to the shifting sky

a slalom of winking-eyed debris catching the light

                                                            to the other side

the cobbles salted with snow on this febrile night

I trace a circle in this summer fall and find it ashen

as more settles on my shoulder like a familiar bird

     from a sky turned crematorium

a millennia of words on the charred wind
I stick out my tongue to catch a floating phrase
     desire for the world has deprived man

     of the object of his desire
turn skyward to face the fall

     Rumi hung from my lips
your letter safe against bone