the sound of time crystallizing is gamelan—that’s my insight—
	I’m in my 70s—I must

possess some of that—notes struck—then muted—
		then struck again

above phantom silence—a wristwatch faceting
	partially erasing

itself as it runs—

					almost like the one-legged man
		pumping

his wheelchair backward across the intersection—
	right leg the note

and then that ghost-limb coding—
		left leg

is zero to him—
	shape of the limb taken near hip

bouncing in his brain
							and it is Saturday

again—beatdown Saturday—meanwhile I’m driving
		crosstown

for artisan bread—thinking of my friend besieged
	by dementia—

morning coffee lost to him—his Zen moment
		on an endless loop

so he is almost Miles Davis some days—
	a bitch’s brew

of redundancy cutting him to pieces—

								one-legged man
		still powering

carriage forward as if he were horse and rider
	predicting
                                                                                                                                                                             
pitiful futures to come—car still idling—mind
		the one-way

mirror watching it all until I too am cinema—
	suddenly

in scene—downtown empty street—I’ve stopped
		for coffee—

								when on cue

another of the city’s extras approaches to ask
	for spare work—

as if I have any of that around—
		his wanting

to be useful
			  to someone		   for something

somewhere
					(me :: this moment)

obliterated by my response—I have none—
										<mute>

he turns away
				<mute>

the contraption that is Saturday morning gonging
	entire car ride home—

am I a good man?—
									am I moral?—

I have pushed friend aside to his singular dying
		these last few seconds—
								<mute>

I have failed at imagining tasks—my zero spare work

not even morphing	 	to spare change

for the space		a single hammered note	   exists

I trouble these things		half-watching

my car’s reflection blur a storefront’s 		     Windex sheen
                                                                                                                                                                                 
its song of commerce		  essential oils

bottled to beautiful bells			impeccably silent—

smell of pulled pork       upstreet			coffee

worked to arhythmic scarves		      by gusts of wind