HOW TO RUN A WIRE FILLING STATION PRINT

Hour when sunflowers bend
Toward other starlight, searching

For a trace of ignition. Don’t fret,
I whisper, infidelity

Is safe with me. Fill up.

            # # #

I park inside the wire station
Turning my mind over

To the vending machine: candy,
Condoms, and a red comb.

Hour when the rooster candles
Her eggs. His peep

Twists like raw filament.

            # # #

Hour when the blue sands
In the neon hourglass

Stop sifting and puddle, last call.

Hour for my rounds. Will
I see you? In the sedan?

Beneath the snow, worrying
The dials for a station

That plays one voice
                     Plus one voice?

Peter Jay Shippy is the author of Thieves’ Latin (University of Iowa Press, 2003), Alphaville (BlazeVOX BOOKS, 2006), and How to Build the Ghost in Your Attic (Rose Metal Press, 2007).  He has published widely, including The American Poetry Review, The Boston Globe, Iowa Review, and Ploughshares. Shippy teaches literature and writing at Emerson College in Boston.