What the Evening Brings

I am singing to my dead African mother tonight
tonight the music swims from my deep-honey tongue
into the moon-washed sky of onyx rot

I am writing with a crippled hand, a shattered mind
is only cozy when the medicine slowly takes
and soothes with the chill of autumn glass

I am believing, I am in desperate need of confession
of possession by a being less likely to steal
kisses and whiskey from full-moon girls

I am frightening the baby boy or the Elephant Man
I can't tell which when the night is this thick
with answers and mongrels pining to dine

But I am not of the right mind.