The Burning of Los Angeles

Streetsweeper wakes me at 3, hour of the wolf.
Lonely, thoughtful job, streetsweeping.
Long thoughts, long & quiet as streets
laying in a coat of ash.

I looked in my father's closet after he died.
I felt his suits, found his comb in a pocket.
I smelled it, his smell. He was gone, the smell
of smoke & him on his comb remained.

The glowing seasick hive of man
held to the world by one red nerve.

Painted on the building across the street:
earthquake mural of a freeway falling
& tidal wave rising out of an orange sky
to swallow the city.

Beyond the Santa Monica Mountains,
a fin of red moon glides.
My eyes come upon a dark jewel of lights.
Remorse prowls the deepening current.