Over time, you picture them
after dark, in searches

focusing on streets and houses
close above the churches

or balancing
on narrow wands of light.

And find so much depends upon
the way you choose

to look at them:
high in the night

their minor flares confused
among the stars, there

almost beautiful.
Or from way back

over the map
from where they might resemble

a business of flies
around the head wound of an animal.