CALL ME BELOVED

I live in the gray, now,
wake and drive into it
and I’m tired of it –

it’s permeated into the quilt-like fabric
on the walls that surround my desk,
woven into all of the blacks and onyxes
and grays I shroud myself in morning
after interminable morning,

so I can stand on the train platform,
too cold to stay outside but too scared
of the people waiting just inside the lobby,
much like the people on the bus
or on the sidewalks, all my travels now
reduced to quick glances and shuffling feet.

Do you catch me staring out windows?
The trees just outside the car
are like strangers to me, impossibly orange
and beautiful as the fall bleeds away
toward winter – gray branches and dark skies
that will drive me closer into you.