Midnight

Dark over
threshold of days.
We are equipoise
between the end & the beginning.
Then the tick, tock of clock
starts it all up again
while we wear
the silks of sleep
descending.

1:00 am

Night, the ocean
where you do not drown,
but float in folds, chase
a liquid shape of forever,
watch it overtop
your bantam boundaries.

2:00 am

Moon slips over ledge –

     leaking backwards light
          lost by sun,
                pressing the thin milky
                      of day over night,
                            contending lux and lumen
                                 make a silent hum –

into variegated darkness
where once I thought
of sleep.

3:00 am

I place my hand on your hip.
Beneath a thousand cells ignite,
blood born in the bone,
sent heart-ward to muscle
that must not rest.
I curve myself around your back,
ribs rise with a half-hiccup of breath.
There are stars somewhere
but I know only blood, breath, and bone
knitting you together
under my hand.

4:00 am

Arcing branches,
their tips above the house.
Moon-frosted light
making way for morning
with blueing of sky
and three sharp trills
of the unseen bird
crying out to the sun:
I need you.

Published in Freshwater 2010