The Cartographer of Dusk

In the hour when streetlamps learn their names, I unfold the city like a patient sail, bridges stitched with the light of late trams, and the river a slow, uninked rumor.

A woman on the corner sells oranges, each one a small sun pocketed against winter. Her breath blooms in the air; I mark it gently, a constellation of warmth I won't explain.

The rooftops tilt their hats toward the hills, antennas combing for whispers of the weather. I trace the alleys where the day's noise pools, and watch it drain into the drains of evening.

By midnight my paper is soft with fingerprints, the map a palimpsest of footsteps and smoke. I fold it and feel the city fold with me, all its rooms humming, all its doors ajar.