Unauthorized Personnel

The inbound five o’nine rolls between neighborhoods,

slicing haze with bright beams

of intangible white,

when the cadence of swaying steel suddenly

lurches into a violent wail

followed by dissonant overtones of screaming friction,

as shadow becomes man before

disappearing into the mist.

His name buried in place of a body,

replaced in the papers by a blanket title:

unauthorized personnel.