"Wine," by Guy Gavriel Kay
Another excerpt today from Beyond this Dark House by Guy Gavriel Kay.
Wine
The lights of houses
push into the village night
a little way and fail.
Drifting through fog
You strain towards windows.
Figures move behind curtains.
Islands of sound.
A baby cries.
Somewhere else
a woman laughs
and then stops laughing.
Wife offered and withdrawn.
In the morning the council houses
will be small, curtains drab,
women harried and wan.
But in fog-weighted night
the rush of tires
is a rushing of waves,
and unseen laughter
incarnates mysteries
and releases them.
Wine
The lights of houses
push into the village night
a little way and fail.
Drifting through fog
You strain towards windows.
Figures move behind curtains.
Islands of sound.
A baby cries.
Somewhere else
a woman laughs
and then stops laughing.
Wife offered and withdrawn.
In the morning the council houses
will be small, curtains drab,
women harried and wan.
But in fog-weighted night
the rush of tires
is a rushing of waves,
and unseen laughter
incarnates mysteries
and releases them.