A neon billboard near where I grew up

It would flicker to life at the dimming of the day,  

then it would start its imperious blinking,

watch over the hours of faraway cab horns, 

and cast light on the wide-eyed and worried.
 
No building stood behind this giant of a sign,

high, as gods were high, neon at the junction

of a main thoroughfare and a small road,

as if nailed to a tree you could not see:
 
Coca-Cola  

breathing red, like a police car, like a God 

Intermittent, there and then not there,

above the name, the commandment ‘Drink',

given while they slept, and they obeyed,
 
the house would be snoring a calm wave,

but out of tempo with the small grunt of sleep

is the syncopation of this neon sign,

flashing red on the faded bedroom wall,
 
on bed posts, mosquito nets, on the restless, 

I was twelve then, I remember no sound 

accompanied this nocturnal pulsing, 

this frisky spectacle was completely mute.
 
I remember the red light go on and off,

blinking on my thin arms as I, supine, 

would reach upward, scream, also soundless,  
begging for my god, for heed, for a hug.