BAD WEATHER
      tune: Bacovian) for Nichita

Persistent rain. The heart
settles for second-best,
for emptiness, for dormancy,
for limp, resistant rest.

Vocatives remain unheard.
It is hard to keep awake.
The mind inhabits heavy limbs,
the damp systems creak.

Mist sinks in around the edges,
the rain talks in stutters,
I sit alone, and drearily.
pick idle rhymes, write letters.

Distant friends feel closer, yet
the landscape will not change.
...