Night Mailman Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

The pewter air has grown
umber. And we're still
waiting for the mailman
at the door. Will he come
with a smooth whirr,

a breeze growing into
a buzz to open the sky's black
book to a page of scribbles
written in lime ink
with crawling, fleeting stars?

Will he ring with the chirp
of a fluting night cricket
erasing a graphite sheet
slowly flipped over
to another brightening page

to splash beams and rays
from the dripping wax,
a low flame on a firm candle
breathing out a silver moon?

Or will he simply let us
slip into the light blanket
of a sky still thickening
into soft bleating fur,

a wooly onyx folding screen
swallowing us
into drumming bowels
calming down slowly
into the warmth of a calm sleep?

(ii)

My eyes are heavy
with creeping sleep
gluing my eyelids into stones.

But my ears are still open
to the rattle
of dry tree leaves in a quivering
jumping long-armed wind
making the sky sing,

no voice of the mailman
heard at the shut
and sealed door breathing
out a stretch of silence.

Until a galloping horse rider
bumps into the door,
as I read off the air
a handwriting
slithering across the sky,

its swinging sword
of lightning striking
a stony surface of night
with a roar and a boom,

as sky's black book
is flipped over to a dark page
perforated by a gale
to leak with sharp silver spears
of roof-tapping rain.

(iii)

The night mail man
gallops off on horse back
into the humming
squeaking air
under whirring tree leaves,

as rain drops fly down
with the silvery soaked wings
of whispering
brown and black birds,

another strong wind
tearing open air onto a page
with long-tailed
exclamation marks,

their hanging dots dropping
off the door with loud knocks.