too late, too tired, too unpoetic

20/30
Dear Chicago. I like your consonants
best. ck. g. all your sharp edges and juts.
the things you try to hide, but when you fold your arms,
your elbows stick out like
chicken wings. like the base
of marble statues. like grave markers.
I can’t whisper you.

And I have been sleeping on this air mattress
on the floor for almost a month and still
I have not seen your backside. The parts you only show to the rivers
or the trains. Chicago. You are
endless. I am such an ant, the pathways
I have memorized from home
to coffee to music to home again.

A month. And I don’t know your middle name. Just Chicago,
and Illinois. I haven’t even seen the lake.
The one you try to make seem
like an ocean. The one that brought me
this rain. your name spells the sound the train makes
when I travel through your veins. sometimes,
I watch the strangers move through their backyards.

I like you best in the evening, when the
sun makes your skyline look like cardboard or
later when you become
all blues.