after the sun goes down our imitation

after the sun goes down our imitation
              of the sun turns on
              and someone must measure the distance between these street
              lights—to assure ample road coverage of the jaundiced light and the mixture of the pitch
              ground
              into the deep gouged ridges of the roadway’s bony
              back—they balance
              illumination against the night
              blindness that passing light causes: even before Achilles we
              learned
to keep one eye
              closed at night the other always
              open and scanning for the enemy—the closed eye
              to preserve itself from the shock
              of flare the incendiary the tracer the Greek
fire—this is ancient wisdom that I share
              with you
              out of love that will keep you alive
              when you may not want
              to live passing through each revolution
              of the lathe—reduced in mass but more
              fully formed and brutal on our bellies
in our in-held breath
              and blood coursing through your eye
feel it saturating—dilating between each streetlight
              that you rush past this throb
              you feel between each enemy each everyday
              glory: the salvation of making
              the rent getting ourselves dressed
              and fed—then at last of cessation
the gravel and soot of the killing
              field pushing its way into your pants under
              the binding of the tight
              belt around a final wound feel the roar
              of its loosening of the dispersion
pinned under the work of the machine
              gun—on our backs now and looking
              up—the passing of the tracer rounds
              like the afterglow of streetlights only makes the scar
              of night more beautiful.