Dark Morning

In my old plaid flannel robe,

nose to cold window, I peek
out at the neighborhood, 4:40 a.m.,
which except for bulbous weak lights,
looks like a smudged sketch.

People's selves crawl through
the last of slumber toward waking
and working and waiting for life
to get better. The new mothers are up,
holding newborns close.

What odd, fragile creatures
we are, huddled behind and under
our wood and bricks, getting on
with our little lives--in spite

of competing catastrophes--
the worst maybe being this
wave of right-wing hysteria
bent on blasting the nation back
to 1860, smashing all the things
that have opened up society
in America. Hatreds turned
loose like rabid dogs. Science
and sanity out of fashion.

I shuffle toward a chair,

sit down, and wonder.