December 17, 2012
Elegy
on Sleep
night falls
we
are still awake
in bleary gray in the dark
illuminated only by halogen lamps and
sleepless
delusions the small possibilities of
the past seem almost
to materialize in our hands slippery soft
as candle wax
or starlight we handle them with such
delicacy
as we might an impossible task and
still
they melt through our fingers why
do we do this to our bodies?
eyes heavy and caffeine-rimmed filled
with the red of memory and
distance the thrall
of self-indulgent melancholy we
cannot
remember the nights once
studded and bright
with magic or starshine dulled and
frozen
the mind slips
dreams sharp and black as scrawled
ink
curling bits of volcanic
stone clawing
at the soft tissue of the
brain but don’t
retrace spiked cavernous thoughts
don’t
let yourself why do we
do this to our bodies?
night leaves me at the feet of a dim
white dawn dissatisfied
