With the Taste of Metal on Its Tongue by Matthew Milia

I can’t believe how reluctant the warmth has been
As we wait
And the shitty cars that jumped the gun
They blast their stereos till the windows shake
With the sound

Yesterday you and me drove out to the place
Where the sun
Shoots down from outer space
And shines off everyone standing there

Dumbfounded in drive-thru lanes
Or the hospital parking lot
On the brink of Pontiac

Well, I still remember how it used to be
When the world was still young
It broke in the morning
It settled in the dusk
With the taste of metal on its tongue

I buried an old lifetime in the off-ramp’s fresh overgrowth mess
Where blue jays and cardinals and starlings and darlings of the scene obsolesce

As the night shuts down all the big-box stores open up for the day
As the day wears on all the traffic lights dangle and blink their lives away

We’re dumbfounded in a set of clothes
That were bought years ago
From some bargain bin
That our grandmother’s knew before they’d go home

I still remember how it used to be
When the world was still young
It woke in the morning
It settled in the dusk
With the taste of metal on its tongue

Appears on Keego Harbor