Light Pollution

When I drive at night,

headlights speed towards me

and my car rocks in the wind tunnels

left behind. On my way to the home I

claim out loud, just so it starts to feel a little less overcast,

I don’t think to count the street lamps

rushing by and glaring

against my windshield, because the light is

bouncing off of the street, the windows, the power lines, my glasses,

instead of illuminating.

bouncing off of the street, the windows, the powerlines, my glasses,

instead of illuminating.

Sometimes I forget that

midnight on a city street

is not the same as midnight in

the middle of a hayfield,

where the closest street lamp sits

burned out at the top of a hill.

When I pull into a nearly-full lot,

I don’t think to count the cars

lined up in front of bulbs glowing from

rows of radiant apartment windows above,

but I can’t forget

looking up at a luminous sky in the middle of the parking lot

and realizing that the stars were hiding from me

somewhere in a field far away.