Procession

They kept a certain intimacy, clean in line

Like the last ray on an unsheathed knife

They walked.

I wondered

At the deliberation, lifting each limb,

The arms twice – as if broken

Or attempting to deal

With the provincial numbness.

Someone told me

It accompanied existence

Stealing thick hours from that flat night.

Just listless, those plum-red gowns

And the lull of advancing feet

Perhaps they thought themselves

Candle-lit, famous

Filing back through the streets.

Two still stood

On the pier, as if on a parapet

Staring out at that drowned blue

And imagining a place different.