JOBLESS IN JANUARY
To Donna
Where shadows fold one by one across a seamless sky,
I wait in the doorway for a new year
frozen by the wheels of the factory clock.
Wind whitens my ears into porcelain seashells
with words that are no longer necessary;
a promise drifts up in yesterday’s ashes
from the bottom of a 50 gallon drum;
I flip a coin in a climate that remains
fixed, foreign, and under glass.
Punctually, I desert any miracles by midday
for those less fortunate, and empty my pockets
slowly into the hands of a snowman.