The Planets

the schoolyard’s a cheap bar at closing time and he’s the last burning match in the ashtray, like the sun with a five o’clock shadow, standing there in scuffed boots and yesterday’s shirt, smoking those little rollups.

three planets roll in — tired eyes, soft hips, pushing strollers that look like busted moons dragging snot-nosed satellites behind them. they move slow, same cracked sidewalk orbit every morning, pulled by that old familiar ache that says maybe today somebody wants me without asking for the rent.

he’s the centre, the big hot bastard, calls himself dad to one kid, flirts with the rest like it’s a profession. the women circle closer, ponytails gone limp, wedding rings turned inward like they’re hiding, the wild years behind them now, hunting something that still bites back.

he walks the line between the painted hopscotch galaxies, hands in pockets, smirk like a switchblade, doling out sweet fuck-all nothings that hit harder than a fifth of Beam. one by one they lean in, smell the smoke and the want on him, let him palm their loneliness for three minutes while the kids scream in the background and the bell rings like a last call nobody answers.

he juggles them easy, moons spinning, planets dripping, a whole solar system of quiet desperation.

and me, I just watch from the curb, thinking that’s the only god we’ve got left — a man who still burns in a universe full of women who forgot how.

cold mothers orbit
the one warm thing in the yard—
the bell, then they’re gone.