Still Life
by Jesse Anger
Above the grey scale playgrounda slow-shutter sky sounds—
dry leaves crawl over concrete.
Static compounds the sand,
impressions time leveled
and wind.
Moot skyscrapers background things—
the immobile swing and spiraling slide.
A dead-watch Sunday. The unasked why.
Rain-marked cars in a silent line.
The leaf-matted stair, the door ajar—
dust on the portrait molts by the chair
in the crosshatched hum of futile air.
On the wall
the second hand crawls to a stop.
An arbitrary hour. An arbitrary clock.
