Fare

A poet I knew was stabbed to death
while driving cab on the graveyard shift.

His last verse was the sound you hear
when you can’t sleep and a car passes

as you lie awake staring at the ceiling,
thinking about what you might write

when daylight comes and you can’t find
the word for something you want to say;

and your mind turns down an empty road
only to hear silence when the motor’s cut.

Header photograph © Zuna Amir.