Crazy Trolley Man

Singing a throat-throbbing dry song, veteran,
your faded army cap shades your eyes, watching
your index and thumb, so poised in space,
a ballet trigger practiced stillness,
pulling the invisible string of a chord
along in the air

Now, shaking cracked hands, you know both ways,
a loose pleading gesture, up and down
as if you're centering a pot - but stone,
not soft mud and clay, never in those hands,
always the rought, sedentary edges.

Lean back onto no pillow,
lean back into space and sleep.