after sunrise

the drive in the early morning hours, when things and light are so close to one another..the light is dark, but people's faces are becoming more visible, more distinct. Empty roads, coldness on your cheeks, slightly cracked lips, your own body warmth enough for you. the beautiful green/blue of the traffic lights burns with a muted glory,almost holy; oil-black crows congregate under the tent, the light on their backs revealing rich purple; the tent a place of solace and shade, held up by taut ropes, pegged into the sodden earth at an angle, with sturdy hands. folded wooden tables arranged, embers on the ground spread in a magnetic pattern.

at the airport a man steps out, and with authority and assurance points to a man holding up a placard with his name and flight details. he stands there, a foot from the exit, takes out his Marlboros and lights up. waits for the other man to come around the barrier. shakes hands with him, but only fingertips touch. doesn't talk. looks at him wistfully, looks into the distance, easy silence. then, when they're nearly out of earshot asks: you're from Lahore, then?

after sunrise there's still fellowship, communion, the ties that bind one human being to another, each of us to the world. not to look within, or too deeply, but to let one's vision and hands fall, strangeness brush past you.

Any one of us, given a certain light,
shall make and be immortal.
---Geoffrey Hill.