At The Break Of The Day: A Poem For Adam—By PJ

Vegas Adam, watercolor by Kelly Eddington, 2024. Based on a reference photo by Joe Ahorro.

At The Break Of The Day: A Poem For Adam Clayton

PJ DeGenaro

AT THe Break Of The Day

A poem for Adam Clayton, on his birthday; very loosely inspired by Walt Whitman’s “When I Heard at the Close of the Day”

I have had my fill of plaudits from the big city

For the work I did in the hot, mad whirligig 

Beneath the pulsing dome and blinding lights.

Now my work is done and I am home again,

Yawning and stepping into early morning

Under a sky rinsed clean of soot and rain.

It’s mud-time now; the earth is soft and yielding 

Under my feet. 

Stretch. Unknot the tired muscles

In back, arms, elbows, wrists.

One by one each vertebra clicks, 

Clean air fills the spaces in-between

And the lungs expand, pink and soft as sunrise.

I drain my teacup and set it down carefully

Among the potted seedlings.

Walk through the still-asleep gardens

Careful not to bruise a bud,

Craning to see above the mists,

Throwing off worry-weight with every step.

Now into the open meadow

Where the grasses grow unbothered

With buttercup, clover, woundwort.

Wind pushes the rushing clouds

And I see that the sky itself is a dome,

A blue dome fretted with golden fire

And common starlings that streak speckled across.

The world opens to me,

Accepting me back.

At the far edge of the meadow, the thickening trees:

Oak, ash, birch and yew, magnolia soon in bloom

The cool canopy where the song-thrushes roost

Singing “Hello hello,” 

And there is my friend

Walking toward me slowly,

The one I’ve missed most.

I see him pause to steady himself

And look up at the branches that bow

And let the light through to touch him—

He reaches out and I can see

The pain, a great dark shadow

Lifting, lifting from his shoulders.