that bit of light

it's easy to keep your head down -
so much crap in the street to avoid,
loose bits of a city, impolite with proportion,
a sidewalk breaking up unexpectedly, repairs to the concrete
all intended to smooth things out but really, mostly,
the path often nothing but a series of hazardous missteps,
a jungle of obstacles and intrusion. you have begun to expect
the lack of easy thoroughfare. you have begun to believe all the reward
is in the work. so yes, you tend to angle your eyes southward,
not because there is beauty there underfoot, not because there's
any lithe romance in the way you have to step around the potholes,
the dog shit, the errant broken toy preventing this narrow course
from being truly pristine. you look down out of obligation,
out of self-preservation, out of a conviction that this is how
to avoid every unpleasant surprise
lurking just beyond your immediate square footage.

so of course, you will miss the topography's great remainder -
each precise chisel of doorway, each translucent window,
each hillside, each bird, each postcard of a view.
you will miss the luminous angle of the moon,
that bit of light which never warns of its arrival,
and yet, once here, changes everything.