Blue Shift
It’s not just that stars
Are yellow photographs
Left for Kafka to enfable
It’s not just that stars
Cover histories and make
Puppets for Rilke
They really do light our nights
Like flash bulbs in Arabia
A Mosque open skyward
A mirage of water
To die for
Wicked games above us
These stars fall on Rimbaud
And replace his guns
His Abyssinnia
With teenaged boats
And lapping
Cresting waves
Like night cafés
In Arles for Vincent
For McLean
—by Douglas Pinson
Across the Universe