There is a window cut below the shin
where bone and omen meet in calibrated light—
the measured grind of progress under skin,
a city yoked to burden, not to sight.
When one arm lifts, the trusses misalign,
their angles learning panic by degrees;
each span goes taut, a nerve along a spine,
each joint remembers weight as if it sees.
He coughs. The ovens answer with a roar.
Bellows collapse. The horizon flashes red.
The Captain mans the gait once more
and shifts the towers toward the city’s edge.
The legs descend. What held becomes a fall,
story by story, crumbling wall by wall.