Sometimes at Night

 I stop and pause on the back deck to study the night sky above me, where a kind of theater takes place:

Dancing stars, piercing the veil

A succession of clouds, entering and exiting

Moons, fat or skinny, no shows, everything in between

From the pit—a crescendo of crickets, a train horn section, the percussive bark of a neighbor dog

Every night a different show, a version of the same

Before stepping back inside I do a dance

On the dimly-lit stage