Watching the twos, threes and fours
of the morning clock.
The sixty second minutes, as they
count the hours off.
Sleep eludes me,
sleep deludes me.
Five is here,
in its cold, dark hour,
Five now passing into six
and still I sit,
unsleeping.
My insomnia wakes me,
my insomnia hates me.
At 4 am when the world’s at rest and the only ones awake are those that should be and those that don’t want to be. I step out onto the balcony, breathe in the deep pine scent which flows down from the mountain. In the clear air the black sheet of night is bejewelled by a thousand diamonds and the planets are visible without the need for technology (except for my glasses). I sit and breathe and look and then I listen to a distant owl, in my usual waking hour before the hooligan cries of the crows begin.
Twisted long dark hours
suffocating
skin drip and turn, turn
over and back
the weight of air
shallow,
lung heavy
sleep evades me
as does the slightest night breeze
sheets adhere to me
as does the vaguest night dream;
now forgotten
the first birds call
in the sticky summer night heat
in the twisted long dark hours
suffocating.
A two hour lie-in or two hours wasted?
Head afuzz with insufficient sleep
At least that’s how it felt when I woke up
flicking on the little alarm clock light
with a dry mouth, warm pillow, cold nose
Who turned the heating off anyway?
A two hour lie-in on a dark winter’s morning
Not exactly an incentive to get up
A reading light under the covers,
A well-thumbed copy of Factotum in hand
Bukowski going from drink to drink, job to job, hole to hole
And me thinking it’s time to get up now anyway.
Night,
split into two:
broken lines
black and white
drawn and then fade
merge
and become grey,
like the dawn;
if it ever arrives.
My eyes are heavy
and my face is sliding
like some lost Dalí canvass;
long dripping clocks
leaking slow time:
sluggish minutes
and
creeping hours
in the long dragging night.
That old adage about “write what you know” – I should laugh in its face and stick my fingers in its eyes.
I started this blog , as it says on the tin (well, the heading), as a pin-board for airing poems and flash-fiction first drafts and ideas. Of late, after a barren summer, I’ve hit a creative vein, with no idea why except it runs in tandem with another bout of worse-than-usual sleeplessness. I don’t want this blog to become a shrine to insomnia so things will change in 2018 (that’s two days and, possibly, two nights…).
This is this blog’s last insomniac poetic hurrah! If I couldn’t write anything else then I would stick my pen where the sun doesn’t shine. Luckily, I can and I have been (just not here, o bored and tired reader).
Have a great New Year everyone and thanks for looking in.
Chris
_______________________________
And still the treacherous night lingers on
and pulls me along with it
incapable of leaving me behind
in a dreaming world of slumber;
the fucker.
And still my words spill across the page
and takes me away for a while,
pulling me into its world
where pen and hand work in unison;
the saviour.
And still my eyes remain open
and my awakened mind rages
full of ideas that fall on paper
as my head wants to fall;
on my pillow.
and yet, and yet…
and yet I love these early hours;
the quiet, the still, the night sounds
– or early morning sounds – take your pick.
A slave to the whore of the morning
fresh on her rounds and as yet untouched,
the sheets still unblemished
and the rose cheeks of her sunrise.
Mind muddled, befuddled
hours awake,
hours reading,
hours doing everything but sleeping
crawling on my knees
to the dawn queen.
Lying there in the dark
looking at every darkened shape
of every angle of every wall
and feel every stubbed toe
on every piece of furniture
lying there in the dark;
like me.
Alarm clock; you are redundant,
again. As ever.
Your services are limited
except when you tell me
how long I’ve been lying there awake.
As I crawl on my knees
to the dawn queen.
The lines were drawn
the enemy position made clear
I was becoming surrounded
but was surrender an option?
Really?
Was I to give my all,
myself to myself
like a Pagan sacrifice to knowledge?
What did I learn?
But the enemy retreated
and I slept the sleep of a clear conscious
(it is)
and I slept the sleep of an innocent soul
(it is)
and I slept the sleep of a hard day’s toil
(it was)
and I slept the sleep of a body and mind broken
(they were)
and so, finally,
I slept the sleep.
Tortuous night
in pain, in the dark.
Piano wire nerves scream
in a white-heat silence,
searing through me,
blazing as I lie
longing for the morning
to bathe me in light
and chase away
this tortuous night.
3000 miles of ocean
as dry as a desert highway
Distinct words from remote voices
I hear you speak
as distances vanish in the setting sun,
my setting sun
as I become the nightfall.
Eyes flicker in the madness of dreams
Then open; awoken
but the images remain
The bark of the beggar
as the sidewinder stamps its tail in the sand
of the desert highway,
where 3000 miles of ocean lay.
The hand reaches for the button
that flashes the green numbers
counting down the hours
of a night that is endless; and awake,
as I long to fall into sleep,
be it restless and haunted,
sleep it remains.
I envy it.
Sleep eludes me, deserts me
It skirts my nighttime like a seige
Sleep seized from the grasp of the sleeper
Who should now be in deep slumber
As I fumble for words
(I write)
“Sleep sir, sleep!” I hear
As once again I fear
To go to bed
Lest nightmares awaken me
Awaken me?
And dreams haunt me
Dreams? Ha!
You have to sleep to dream
Sleeps eludes me, deserts me
My night perched on a precipice
A night-borne orifice
Black and deep
Like the narcotic sleep
(I crave)
My Words, My World 