Kristallnacht

And he knew the wine had worked
by the tiles upside-down
on the dusty Scrabble board
he'd stolen from his father

and he knew he didn't care
when he won and killed the lights;
another vixen smitten
with a man he never was

and the note he left at dawn
had the number for a cab
so she could catch her train
and he could come home tired

to a bed made for a change--
empty, but his own.

And he knew the stench of fate
as it crept into his nose.