This sleep does not suit me,
this sleep without youth.

Heavy lids and heavy lies the body but
my mind takes shape reminiscent of
waves and the mermaid fins, dreams of
glittering beaches to wake up sweating
mid-winter.

Why is it that I putter and sink into crevices deep, still?
Why is it that I cannot share the moon? Her piercing
brilliance has endured eons alone, and
I feel a comrade in her shivering ripples.

This sleep, my darling,
I will not allow it.

Constant
inople.

Raspberry pie
in bed.

These are the dreams
of you I have
in my heavy
little head.

I hear an awful lot about
fingertips these days and
I wonder how many I'll have to touch today,
tomorrow and
the rest of my life.

The fingertips and palms of my own hands are
worried and weathered, both due to
lack of sleep and the
guitar that waits for me, always.
Gentle, the very sight calms my belly-
aching and these calluses left where I
refuse to bruise or to bleed.

When I work myself into time's duck and weave,
and I don't have to wonder how long it will take or
when I'll be able to croak out a few lines, I can only
hope, complete with the yellow wings of a canary,
that I can last longer
than this dance does.

Erase
erase
erase and
rewind.

As long as I'm a child,
I won't mind,
I don't
mind.

I'll never know
if those are
giant troll heads

or people

behind me,
will I?

everytime our eyes meet it is
Anthony and Cleopatra,
it is ee cummings and his
dark-haired mistress, it is
every love affair that has ever been
lived again and
again and
again

in those brief seconds
when our eyes meet, in those
I can feel you
looking for a reason
to kiss me
forever
searching
me

tell me when you find it,
and let me hold it in my lips
for the next time
our eyes
meet

my food has begun to taste as
I'm sure I've begun to
look:

grey
quiet
tired and
mean