My Felt Hat Worn In
A Place Not My Own 

Residual clouds shade
still life layers across
an urban morning otherwise
hatched and crosshatched
by transit commuters, 

a day without an underline
but free fall pointillist rain,
darkening bistre trees in
city lot grades, smattered
road signs, traffic signals, 

backload delivery trucks
that rattle into brattled
bolts of metallic seconds
when through intersections
of dissipated avenues, as 

watched by the tabby cat
in an upper story window
reckoned by dry silence,
blithe brick, framed glass,
his grey wistful vantage-