dawn sounds

Mornings have the smell of desperation
Clean air, sharp from the cold, irritated by the inhalations of daytime animals, waiting for the sun to wake it up
People going about their beginnings and preparations, at this hour mostly preparations for other people's beginnings–
Milk deliveries, trash collection, transporting meat or fish or vegetables along their last mile
Trucks barrelling down night road rifles, rushing ahead of the rising line
The smell of menthol and the look of a too-fast heart fluttering.
The predawn is a trap – a suburban home in a city learning its limits, flung too far to crawl back in.
A time for unmakeable decisions, for the wringing of hands,
For the gathering of evidence that will later be understood to be of, among other things, helplessness,
rage, resignation.
Dawn is for pigeons and crows on powerlines
Not yet willing to cede the road to us daytime animals
Watching you fail to figure out how you will survive one more day of maths and physics and oh, god, chemistry
Watching you listen to the same five songs, dreaming.
Days, like crumpled paper, form a shell once the heat really pours in, once
You have a few hours under your belt and no excuse not to have finished beginning,
Once lacquer pools in the creases, tearing, reinforcing. Finding a shape in which to break.
Before the sealing, before the catastrophe of it–
–the day soft in its beginning–
Isn't safe.