There are days like these

she says,

and there are days like that.

Days where the ink-and-paper lighthouses you’ve built

sing songs of El Dorado

and all you can do is

listen and learn

hurt and yearn.

Late into the night

our legs dangle over city-streets

watching city-lights

and the aeroplanes

always the aeroplanes.

We hear the sweet sad songs of anonymous traffic

travelling – forever travelling –

on roads that do not stop

by the little, dusty towns

but speed on – forever on –

toward tomorrow.

They put up new floodlights at Hill Park over the weekend

and there are new stars in the sky

winter’s over

they say,

while I shiver from the cold.

(Kazuo Ishiguro, ‘Nocturnes’)