JANUARYI cooked pastawith chiles lastnight and myfingers stillburn. It's how the mindfeels these days,you say, uponarrival, and wesit with this. Iam so angryI cannot touch you.MODERN GODSBacklit by the glowof a small passageway,he kneels into the fogof yellow light,head kissing the carpet.I step around him,respecting his privacy, whenthe mat becomes not prayerrug but builder's tool,a black piece of tarmac, laid downbefore the bank so he couldpeer close, fix the dead motion sensor so that peoplewith money could be seen, all doors openingfor them.OPEN ALL NIGHTThe park beneath the parkis open all night,people sprawlacross benches,this way andthat, one man sits straight upas if in a pew, eyesclosed, bags at hisfeet, rocking tothe rhythm of the parkbeneath the park.You can stroll here,take your coffee,you may even on occasionfeel the whisper of a breezeas we rush in to the Mabillionstation, the slatted windowsof this park on wheelsletting you know, there isa world outside, a placeabove whereon gravelled quadrantswe are not alone, wherea sound beneath everysound says, we are not alone,and you can feel it,like a humming in the blood, howwhen there is no hawk falling likea blade, no wolf lopinginto view, no marmotnosing the cracks in whatwe made of its pavementwe are lonely and ashamed. We are too much ourselves,and we sit, one to a benchsometimes if the stink is toomuch, one man to a wholecarriage, riding in the parkbeneath the park, erasing the darkhours in the white electric light.