Drowning

It was one of the few days when I could not wait for the sun to set,
To bring about darkness and its invisible stink,
A cold smell perpetuated by an unseen moist blanket
That permeated my every pore as I sat upon a stained orange chair
On a porch littered with filth, empty cans, crushed cigarettes.

My vision strained as my eyes adjusted to the dying light
And stung as a dense cloud of smoke,
A ribbon, a tendril from a glowing ember of ash,
Rested casually between my two fingers in one hand,
While a book was being ignored in my other.

A man next door set about with a metal rake
And rasped the soil of the earth noisily, combing
And styling the grass as he saw fit,
Amassing a collection of fallen leaves, the signal of
Dead weather and coldness to come.

The sun sat just below a low level of branches
Of a pine tree that blocked my vision of the sky,
Orange in the distance and radiating a pink glow.
Once it gave up its last hope on my waking world
Would I drown myself in the unsight to come.