Sky slips a catalogue of stars into mailboxes
all over your river town. Midnight, and Pleiades play
their old game. A train whistles its way.
Blackbirds ride ditch asters that hallow the deer
slipping out of her dun coat in the grass,
turning back its unhemmed red edge to the dark.
Porch lights cast a net where the river makes its bend,
and from there your little town glistens
like a cocktail dress flung across the bed
burning itself out against shelterbelt black.
— Lori Brack
The Coop: A Poetry Cooperative 