A couple of hours
before the sun comes up:
coffee, second cup,
in a mug decorated with cacti
and the words MI CASA ES SU CASA;
seven-year-old laptop,
for blogposts, social media,
the flotsam and jetsam that passes
for the news of the day;
Wallace Stevens' Collected,
to re-read "Sunday Morning";
air conditioning
as it's a sultry night,
outrageously so
for this close to October;
your book,
with poems of accuracy,
vitality, attention;
my reading glasses
parked where they should be.

But what among these objects
of 3.36 am
will bring out the poet in me?

I'll sit here and write
until I exhaust the coffee,
or maybe until morning comes
with its bombastic sun
and the noise of commuters
and the riot of society's voices,
cantankerous beaks
that bicker and banter and boast.