I saw a black rose

The dusk of so many yesterdays

clinging to it, a cloud of velvet tongues

I would borrow its secret, if I could

for my own ephemeral flight.

The city air chafes the bud,

but the bloom that comes is biological, tender

and dark, a daydream of asphalt, long sirens

An ounce or so of malcontent,

slipshod poetry of the living,

and in-between thorn and stem

A silence.