On nights without clouds, despite the sullen varnish

we've dulled the sky with, no other star in sight, you heave

your slow parabola across the curtain gap above

the television set. I cannot see what rapt lovers you drag,

those pomegranates tumbling in orbit, nor those pastel bands

you spin so hectically, nor the streams of moonlets you suck in.

Only when I look you up in books do you become eloquent

in impossible numbers, spectacular chemistry. Beyond these,

out there, you're just that one bright thing that slides

time and again in ominous trajectory across the pane.