Costermonger

Stay out past midnight: exhaust yourself.
Stay out past midnight: stare down the darkness
Stay out past midnight: listen for echoes
Stay out past midnight: unseal your fate.

Better to throw off the blanket
Of Infernal summer
Than to try to sleep amid the babel
Of arguments and prayers.
Better to open the window
To no breeze
Than to breathe between the odors
Of awful things gone bad.

Commerce never sleeps through the night.
Commerce never sleeps until dawn.
Commerce never sleeps in a nightshirt
Commerce never sleeps in stocking feet.

Do not permit the gathering din
Of selling and buying
To drown out your thoughts
Of anything but business.
Do not permit the ancient questions
How did I get here? and
Is this all there is?
To come out "What can I get you today?