John Muellner

CLEVELAND AVENUE

When an ambulance and its contained blaze 
arrows through the street outside the library 
I turn my music off to capture the puncture 

of another’s pain before red, 
slapping the autumn night, 
cries itself to sleep and the block returns 

to dark. What business 
do I have confiscating fragments 
of another’s turbulence, no matter how gaudy?

When I have done wrong, I write the mistake 
in a note and can’t look away. 
What was originally meant as a process 

of healing, getting my error out of my system, 
becomes a crash I replay. Feel it again. Feel it 
again. Feel what exactly? The shame 

of my poor behavior, my larger-than-life mouth 
telling stories that aren’t my own? Who am I 
to speak on another’s collision? The note 

is dopamine, feel it again, feel it again. I can’t help 
but roll my thoughts through a field 
of the sharpest glass. Mal-intent meadow. 

Is it that I’ve found my voice? Yes, my mouth 
is a new siren that the rest of me chases.
I’m reminded I can knife tires the way others 

have puddled mine as I reread my damage.
At a distance I apologize, but don’t ask 
forgiveness. Head down in the library, 

I hear a second ambulance steal the street. Cure 
can’t beg forgiveness from those it blows past. 
The flashing is bright, but soon slips 

from the window as the night composes itself. 
The horns still find their way to my ear though, 
reminding me that healing is louder than pain.

John Muellner (he/him) is an LGBT writer who holds an MA in English with an emphasis in Creative Writing & Publishing from the University of St. Thomas. His work can be read in Gertrude Press, Denver Quarterly, New Delta Review, Emerson Review, and elsewhere. He lives in Minnesota.