Taryn Allan

Minimal Dark

Street lights aren’t orange any more
So we’ve lost that dreamy haze
That pumpkin-coloured glow
Which made every night feel
Like a nostalgic flashback in a movie
Impermanent and eternal
In equal measure

Beneath that light
Every spilled liquid
Beer
Blood
The urine-soaked in-between
Took on the fathomless depths of the night sky
Blackly boundless like a patch of dream
The sleeping mind had yet to fill in

Now the street lights are perfectly white
Shining pristinely
Like the sterile oppression of a dental surgery
A bleak illumination of every part of
The diorama of the city night
No longer a dream
But a painful waking to the reality
That this is all there really is

I made a romance of my night walks once
Now there’s only the minimalism
Of one foot following another
Going nowhere in particular.