Parabolic Mirror

Glowing embers crackle, snap and tackle to the hearth

A retreating brisk and chilly stronghold on the dawn

As the willow weeps and wrings its sad song to the world

Awaking with it, weeping out, a new day comes unfurled.

*

Then piping cinders, daylight hindered, through the skyline curled

Stalking, stabbing, prickling, grabbing fog of murk and smog.

Buildings tower, pigeons scour, cower 'neath the seething sun;

A march of headlights, squinting through, like diamonds on the run,

*

Coyotes yowl, a howling owl, their dawn song come undone,

Whilst crickets quaver, dogwoods waver with a balmy breeze.

Though all of this, a teasing ease, for progress murmers nearer

No more is clearer; murk and smog, a parabolic mirror.