Thursday, September 8, 2011

No sleep. Just Thoughts.


11:32 P.M.
You swallow your sleeping pill and chase it with a kiss before we lie
down in the darkness, pure dark when electricity first vanishes.
I don't recognize these familiar shapes, even the shape of your body,
only small circles of light burning their piercing colors into my retinas.

I stare at the shadows dancing across the roof as streetlight
streams in through the window. It reminds me, the world is outside.
Voices bustle, murmured
past 2 A.M.

Just lying there. I think about mid-November and the way I cried
about your dad more than you did. That's how we started, or rather,
when he ended. Then I find my mind on January when we first fell apart.

I feel the weight of my limbs sinking lower
into the mattress, into the dent in the side I sleep on.
I notice the strands of my hair set loose
in the sheets (I know how that pisses you off)
and a hazy outline of my face near the wall, adjacent
to the hole that still needs repair; you need it too.
The wall never changes even when everything else does.

We're tucked into these oversized sheets
(too big for a twin bed)
like corpses in a coffin. I feel the dead
weight of your arm across my waist. Heavier, heavier.
My eyes fizzle with the light of the clock.
4:08. Yes, in the morning.

I exhale a sigh of frustration. You're like a secure barrier
keeping me tucked inside the sheets. Trying to, anyway.

I extend my arm across your back and send my fingertips exploring
the vast mountain of your shoulders where you keep the stress, bottled up.
My attempt at comfort. No sleep. Just thoughts of it.

Yeah, you took your damn pills. Your sleep comes more easily now.
But I carry your stress under my eyes. Dark circles. Dark thoughts.
Thoughts of your dead father, buried now for almost four months' time.

Carry the casket, the sorrow. Now I carry part of the blame
for your explanations as to why you run from thoughts of death.
American “hush hush.” Hispanic “lo siento.”

Alcohol and pills: Your survival guide to life.
I just want to fix you; us; this whole complicated scenario.
We're sleeping in his coffin. Sounds so fucking cliché.
7:45 AM- time to wake up.

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