Guard the rails and fall off of them.
These parapets are a town that ain't
big enough for the most of us. Only the
overconfident can promenade, marching
the night shift, short shrifting the glitter
so that the title: grifter fits. Stars keep
watch and ensure that the watchful
can borrow the age of the cosmos
to feel appropriately small. But this
is not what the people on this fence
line are doing. These barbed individuals
are residual ambits, gambling their tamped
bitterness into a high-pressure toffee that
will always stick to the sharpest teeth,
dulling them, lulling them into a harsh
sense of obscurity. Let the sideline
cynicism flow like a stochastic wind,
turning the grinder so that the fine print
turns into a glint in the byline, a subtext
of hexagonal red signs printed clearly,
indicating that one should become zero
for as long as it takes to determine
that the threats at this intersection
are as terrifying as the moon in a heat.
Roman Ryan 