The Owner Of The Night

Interrogates whoever walks

This shadow-lane, this hour

Not reserved for you: who

Are you to enter it?

Orion’s head over heels

Above the road, jewel-belt

Flinting starlight

To fuel two eyes looking

Down from the air:

Beacons in reverse,

Since light pours in

Toward her appetite

Until she wings her noiseless outline

Between our rooftop and the stars,

Over this door and all the doors

Hidden in the grass:

Dreaming voles,

Firefly province,

Wasps in the palace

They’ve hollowed under the hill.

Mole resting his face against his splayed hands.

Perch, blink. Pose

The evening’s question

To the sleepless

While the moon if there is one

Scatters islands

On a field of ink. Who

Maps this? The owner

Of the night looks down

To mirror and admit the hours

Before the upper vaults

Begin to lighten and recede.

Did you hear what I said,

A face looks down from the night?

Did who hear me? Who

Reads this page, who writes it?