Midnight light-dreams dawn—
green is the solar song of Morpheus 
blown earthward, 
rippling curtains of color 
drawn back 
by angles of snow geese,
their wingtips dipped 
in dark arts,
to reveal the silver of a silent screen
in an art deco movie palace.
The Little Tramp dines 
on his shoe
at the top of the world.
 
At the top of the clock
a somnambulist strolls
through off-kilter streets
like your dad, 
the way he shadowed
himself along the streets 
of your childhood,
along the streets
of your evolving metropolis.
The way he finally came to craft 
for you 
a refined city of cardboard.
 
My people once looked to the sky.
Rising from the damp earth
my grandfather climbed ladders to telescopes
on frigid nights.
Let’s say the sun is its own mind.
Let’s say the sun needs the body 
of Gaia to dream a multiverse 
of possibilities,
needs the clenched magnetic field 
to exhale at its axes
allowing earth and sun,
their many children,
to forge dreams of midnight light.