For reasons unclear to me now,
my friend Tom and I sat in a ditch before dawn,
neither drunk nor injured,
to watch the birth of the sun
over the junk weed litter of the world.
Knowing philosophy arises
from standing at odds with the
consensus,
we hunkered among
beer cans,
hubcaps,
tires with no wheels,
wheels with no tires,
and a condom still in its foil,
hoping for the shade of Socrates to appear
disturbing what we knew to be true
and therefore partly false.
Tom picked up a damp leaflet
announcing something
we couldn’t read in the dark.
A car rumbled past,
headlights poking holes in the future
as it bled red into the exhausted past.
The sun came, as expected.
We read the leaflet.
A warning:
JESUS IS ON HIS WAY!
“That’s useful information,” I said.
“Isn’t he always?” asked Tom.
“No doubt,” I replied.
“I can only hope,” Tom said.
1974