no one got the mail today

During the show rumbles overhead.
coming out of the blackbox
purple shifting skies catch yellow distant lights and
flash quiet far-off thunder.

Walking in the front door
coming home that's only sometimes home
wondering if I'll ever come back to myself
My brother plays softly stroking strumming guitar.
Parents' bedroom door open across the hall--no one to wake up inside
The room is empty.

I open the front door, then the back, to let more sky inside my house.
It's brighter at night. Cleaner, the sky.
and walk out onto the driveway  picking up the mail.
Two-thirty am and there's a cricket in the garden, just one. Doing his own thing.
Singing louder than the others--soloist performance. Midnight arias wistful and alone.
Reach inside the dark mail box my fingers find nothing.
Walk back beneath the fruiting trees and smash purple berries underfoot, grinding seeds and juice into
purple stained pavement.

The mail never came today, that's just the kind of day it was.
But the night air after the rain was sweet cedar and rose dew drops, summer honey and sleeping breeze.
(I used to run to the mailbox everyday, heart pounding in my throat, hoping against hope.)

This morning
woke up early to find the front door still wide open
and no one had come home.