The Last Bus Home

 Mahogany laughter
rollicks on from the back seats
of the fluorescent transit
huffing through the one a.m. streets.
The conversations drone
like a Seattle rain
intended for no one
in particular
on the last bus home.

For no one seems to care,
tranquilized by the deep gray
that looms over the city
in clouds sleeping off one more day.
Music from an iPhone
dances in crystal arcs
rising and touching down
in the closed space
of the last bus home.

But what is the reason?
Where is the sign? –
in this night journey
of a winter mind.

Now we’re riding through
the blackened trance of cedar
and fir that lines the highway
unlit by February stars.
Streams of muted neon
from store fronts wash into
the eyes of the alone –
drunken and weary
on the last bus home.

2012