20150601 (disturbed sleep)

Hieronymous Bosch, detail of center, The Garden of Earthly Delights 

Insomnia is the failure to orgasm

Of the sleep reflex. Settled comfortably in 

Dog at the right, cat nestled left

The book’s weight escapes the grasp

Or the last three paragraphs seem

Puzzlingly similar. Almost there

Excuse me, Sophie, time to put the book away

Reaching to switch off the lamp

It’s clear: Ain’t gonna happen

Relax. Give it a minute. Relax

Too bad. In the dark a while rods

Wake gradually revealing the bedroom 

In almost complete detail: the doors

The table with the heap of clothes

This is just a silly turn of events

By now it’s productivity time so

I think of Chekhov who wrote at night

Of Merton keeping watch at the monastery

Noting the sights and sounds to pass

The hours from the night’s last prayers

To the day’s first as he paces 

The cloister’s worn, polished stones

The digital figures 03:33 glowing red

Confuse me. I put the book down 

At one-thirty must have slept some

In the bathroom again, proven old man

Back to bed this time no cat to cuddle

Somehow away to a Grand Guignol

That would send Freud running home to mama

I, naked in the Garden of Earthly Delights

Leaping with abandon for hours 

Between lusts and torments. Wherefrom?

I took my meds, I check on rising

Blood sugar 138. Dog walked the whole block 

I make it to City Hall for the Zoning Appeal

Moved to the 22nd but my neighbor appreciates

Me being on time. I excuse myself, return home

And with Loki on my lap fall asleep reliably

To the drone of Democracy Now!


c. J.S.Manista, 2015