Oracle

This week Kira has been dreaming--
dreaming of smoke signals
puffing gray out of
a lake of pale fog;
a ravine half-full of mist;

dreaming of graffiti
scrawled underneath the eaves
of the tower of a subdivided Victorian;

dreaming of the staccato chatter
of a freight train
swaying over a truss bridge
tapping out a prisoner's message
from she-knows-not-which cell.

Now she's listening
and her waking day murmurs to her--
oak trees snapping in
the hostile cold of a February shortcut;
wind off the lake
strumming the guy wires of a phone pole--

a child in a circle of children
whispering corrupted data.