They don\u2019t tell you there are fewer stars
in some places than others.
The city frightens them
with the threat of their obsoleting, and they hide to save
their light. There are fewer stars in places where personhood
is loudest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They don\u2019t tell you alienation is spelled
in unfamiliar constellations. Astronomic signposts dip
out of sight, occluded by some dark enormity
as the jet crew slides the planet
between you and your homeland lights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You lack context and it shows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Streetlights here are a strange colour, stirred and filtered
through pigment washes of aged grime, graffiti, someone\u2019s
mistake, someone\u2019s
purse, the rats\u2013records of changing walkways, a sky
they mirror and defy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You have been told there are so many lights in every city
that they are visible from space stations\u2013even the highways, traceable
with one\u2019s finger against orbital glass. You envy astronauts because
through those interstitial windows, they might still glimpse
familiarity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Standing deep in the city\u2019s gullet, you clumsily
triangulate the route
of your signal beacon home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A subway ceiling intercepts it, humming its reply.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
They don\u2019t tell you there are fewer starsin some places than others.The city frightens themwith the threat of their obsoleting, and they hide to savetheir light. There are fewer stars in places where personhoodis loudest. They don\u2019t tell you alienation is spelledin unfamiliar constellations. Astronomic signposts dipout of sight, occluded by some dark enormityas the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"single-no-separators","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27,"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26\/revisions\/27"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circlejourney.net\/writing\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}