The night beside me
Night Wakes Me
Night wakes me. It wants something it doesn’t
know how to ask for. What is it? The ragged tabby
who roams the neighborhood moaning in feral orange?
The leaking traffic that shimmers the dewgather with
white noise? What is it you want? I get up and press
a button. Motherboard tells magnetic plates to spin
and the window holds a pregnant moon. The stars
have poured milk onto our quiet little street and
snowlight floods everything. What is it? Is someone
thinking of me six thousand worlds away?
Do you wish the company of unslept poets who might
praise and stroke you back to sleep, tell you you're
beautiful and rub your twinkling skin until slumber
takes you right through to approaching dawn? A
nightbird calls on cue to say yes to all of the above.
Crickets pause, my wakeless gaze settles. I graciously
comply. Returning back to the empty bed, I realize
I too want something I don’t know how to ask for.
I open the window to let the night in beside me.
We can all go back to sleep now.
Joseph Gallo
April 2, 2007 ~ 5:22 am
post-time 8:44 PM
4 Comments:
Simply lovely, Joseph. The end of this one is sublime. Bravo.
Thanks, Joni. Now quitit. ;-)
I'm not looking for beauty sleep any longer, I'm just trying to get enough passable sleep.
Though my reading takes place in morning mid-hours it feels like I were being wheeled out in a pram in some oneiric way, for it's not difficult to anticipate a smooth dawning after finishing these lines.
:)
Well, that's a new one on me, Jonice: oneiric
(ō-nī'rĭk) adj.
Of, relating to, or suggestive of dreams.
I love learning new words and their etymologies. Thanks for that one.
Yes, the dawn smoothed a bit sleepyheaded as it took me an hour to resume dreamhood. Thank you for your comment, dear.
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