Now

Now






Now is no lonelier or more eternal Christmas Day,
Spent in homeless moments in an
Un-rented brick-walls basement, of
Unknowing tenants’ house.

Once raging cross the campus,
Killing students, then Gang Lu himself,
In the shadow of a spree killer,
Now is endless seconds on a one-room bed, where
Memories are lapsed, by
‘Safer’ mental illness and college and exhaustion.

Now is the greatest pause;
An earthquake-shaken city, where
Once cordons for a forty-thousand protest
With policemen wearing jackboots, delimit less than
Empty avenues of severed bus lines like misfired-nerves, and 
Structural infirmity, like maybe broken bones or hairline fractures,rests
In recovery and peace, so that
Now is not worse, and therefore graced.

Now is that once too filled with awe to hitch a ride
Above a stretch of interstate two thousand miles, the
Earth is even laid at dusty, road worn feet,
Under Montana skies without an end.

Hans Lillegard