Lights

I light my room with white Christmas lights
nailed along the edges of the ceiling.
They don’t remind me of winter anymore
except for the shadowless light they cast.
I don’t remember Christmas in their light.
Neither do I think of Christ, the tiny
lights in the sky over the manger,
or the one that showed the way.
They are not a poet’s lights, not
the lights of apocalypse or prophecy.

They are the lights that banish
the darkness just enough to read by.
Some of the bulbs have burned out.
The string has pulled itself off
of a few nails. They’re empty of ghosts.
The eyes that give light to objects
have closed. The light has lost its mind.