Looking Back

Looking Back

Evenings we went under breakers of news,
Each wave seething and receding, seething
And receding. The anchors held us still, 
Kept us from drifting out into the yard
Where the final fireflies anyone
Would ever see were signaling to us.
Then we would have looked up at the first stars.
The first stars had it hard. All those wishes 
They couldn’t fulfill. They must have welcomed
The other stars’ company like the first 
People to arrive at a funeral.
The stars were real then, real the moon
Someone had been at again with a knife.
What would we have wished for had we stepped out?
Myself, I’d have wished for more out of life.