Leaning Against a Pole at Midnight

I’m not cold
but you wouldn’t know that
as you throw the blanket
over my hunched form.

There’s always too much sentiment
in words,
but not today,
today I expect nothing of you, reader,
human, nothing,
nothing but your eyes
grazing over what I’m saying.

I’m not cold
cold is its own reflection
it reveals itself
in fogged breaths and stiff forms
by its basic nature
it betrays its presence.

I wouldn’t expect you
dear reader,
to know what to do
when there are no people about,
when the earth takes on the
form of the universe
and loses all self-identity.
I have no claim
on what I see
with streets darkened
by abandonment.

I’ve shrugged off the blanket,
if you can see
I want my body to gauge its own warmth
To aid itself
in the combat of an external cold.

Did you know streetlights
generate warmth
look up and feel the small circle of illumination
cut into the darkness below you,
did you know they know things
we do not?

Ah, reader, human, warmth,
I promised no sentiment
it is not for things of this,
I cannot contradict the hour I live in
or the incomprehension
flecked in your eyes.

Do not put the blanket
over my shoulders,
do not ask me why I do not leave,
let me close my eyes and say,
“The streetlight—“ I mean,
I am not cold.