Ash

The old man on the balcony
across Ash
keeps watch over our street,
whose brief name
spells out the powdery end of things.

The public air transmits
his days wirelessly
to my open window:
the undisciplined bark of his phone alarm
the radio’s diffusion of weather and sports
the entreaties of grey-suited heralds of God
the greeting to an indifferent neighbour
the wet choke of his cough
the folding of his empty chair
the sighing exhaustion of day’s end.

As I listen,
it seems I should be able to step out
and walk on the thick summer air
across Ash below
to silently enter his flat,
where I imagine seeing:
an odalisque on black velvet
a sink rimmed with amber rust
car parts degreasing in a coffee can
the carcass of a blind television
the curling pages of last year’s calendar.

I don’t know. Perhaps that is unfair.
Perhaps his flat, like mine,
is spare and airy,
decorated with his daughter’s awards
for films on climate change, refugees,
the forthcoming vaccine,
his radio always tuned to CBC One,
as he listens and waits
as I listen and wait
for news of the annihilating fire.