watching flamelight flicker on
beams
and rafters I said to myself
I
want
to go find some open space and
look at the sky
so I pulled on fleece-lined
jacket watchcap gloves
blew out the candles stirred the
coals
and slipped through pantry doors
into the dark
cold fastening its mask on my
skin a shadow now
I moved down steps onto mossy
path through
roofless forest alder columns
pale in shafts
of half moon’s lamp soft leafmold
underfoot
over graded road through open
gate onto frozen turf
I’m in the graveyard now face up
searching for familiar patterns
where are the Dippers
ah Orion’s belt slanting
between firs
settles my sight back down to
where I stand
in a field of frost
sparkling to match the sky
but something’s wrong uneven
ground
hard tracks from treads of some
big
dirtmoving machine
what
happened here
I whirl around
is everyone all
right
of course everyone’s all right
laid out in familiar patterns on
the Earth
under a glittering blanket more
all right
than anyone else around except
stones and stars
