Nothing can happen right now

[DieterM]

… outside, the city’s steamy halo
drifts like the soft glow of skin
into weightless night hours,
and up there five tiny dots,
I mistake them for airplanes at first
but they won’t move,
they won’t cross the dirty grey sky,
they seem to reverberate the five street lamps below,
their street lamp gloom upon rain-wet asphalt,
I fix the five stars high above,
they may be dead, may be pulsating still,
they won’t move, not now,
because nothing can happen right now,
and cigarette smoke swirls around me,
then swirls out of the window
into the weightless and dirty grey night…

[Hawkman]

Hi Dieter. This struck me quite forecfully as a really evocative mood poem, but not until the last five lines. I may be way off base here, but those last few lines really stand out. The opening isn't bad, although personally I'd have put "Outside," on a line of its own and followed it up with

"the city's steamy halo drifts
like the soft glow of skin."

Unfortunatley you lose me here, too much information about dots and what you thought they might be and what they are not etc. etc. You're capturing a moment and a mood, so all the pedantic detail seems at odds with what I, rightly or wrongly, perceive to be the spirit of the piece. I feel that the ephemeral, intangible atmosphere of the opening lines has hit the pavement where the reflections are. Carry us up towards the light with the cigarette smoke. Try:

"Outside,
the city's steamy halo drifts
like the soft glow of skin
beneath the weightless stars.
But they won't move, not now,
because nothing can happen right now.

Cigarette smoke swirls around me,
through the window
and into the dirty grey night.

I appreciate this isn't perfect and that it may not be the direction you were originally steering in, but it does fairly represent how the poem registered with me.

You always have something interesting to say Dieter.

Live and be well - H

[Bar22do]

It is an effective poem, now I'm as gloomy as the atmosphere you describe. But don't worry, I'm in the days of gloom anyway, your words help it out! And after all, as long as there are five stars there shining, no matter dead or alive.. best to you
Bar