The Times are Different Now.

The Fireflies are dead.
The city lights still remain
but suffer no loss or humane shimmer
as any star should.

The doubt has evaporated,
but the basin has dried out:
and the Metropolitan has grown dimmer,
The ever-shivering blackout.

Sickly, the morning mist
and aching eyes leave nothing to the blue-gray,
only invisible-- I cover my eyes.

The radiance of those nights I once knew
--the luminescent breath of the city at your window--
--your beautiful smile as we drifted into dreams
is gone--

exists only
behind my eyelids;
the erratic R.E.M.
and the eternal fever.