Here Nor There

Drunken students from the party next door

strike matches in the alley below our window

The flames hiss to, then snuff themselves out

like stars, like a pain in my chest

All night my heart swims, a fish through ash,

through the memory of itself

All night the ghosts of cars rev their engines,

gunning through the cross sections of my dreams

The next morning, you wake first and find them

on the porch, the bottle caps, arranged to spell

I want...

Matthew Guenette
Copyright © 2002

Matthew Guenette teaches Composition and Literature at Heartland Community College in Normal, IL. He received an MFA from Southern Illinois University in 1999.