Tonight's Poet Corner: Francisco's Fever Dream

Francisco's Fever Dream
by Belinda Roddie

City somnolence, a sleeping
pill taken half past noon. A man

shakes a coffee cup on the corner of Fifth
and Market. No one seems happy.

A chess piece breaks in half on
a board. Trojan horse, split wide open,
all the Romans spilling out in a confused

heap of martyrdom. They don't look
at the players, the tourists who rush

by their tables. Their eyes are set
at ten minutes to despair.

I am sitting on a bench spotted with
birdshit and meaningless graffiti. The code
for the tag team has worn off to the most

commonly used letter of the alphabet. How
little I could put down if that letter were
missing. It is a piece of me, a molar
in my row of bottom teeth, a fragment

of brick in an earthquake-disturbed church.
The brisk, fragile creaking of wind
vocalizing distrust to the contaminated

bay water below. Loose, necessary strings
of conversation in foggy corners and
sticky diners. Symbolized by the frost.
The glow. The artificial fireflies.