Some days,
Some nights,
Some minutes,
Some seconds,
I lay in my bed,
Eyes open,
To the ceiling,
To the wall,
To the window,
To the dead insects on the windowsill,
All closing in on the bed
In which I sleep.
Sometimes I listen to music
On an old dusty stereo,
Or write sloppy poems that never quite make it
There,
In my bed.
And sometimes,
I can hear the insects far away,
Still living,
Through the walls,
Thin as paper
Here,
In my bed.
I wake up,
Same time,
Every time,
Same place,
Every time,
Same bed,
Every time.
And there’s no
Leftover spoiled
Beautiful lover next to my left flank,
Only the harsh realities
Of the first daylight,
Raping my self-conflicted illusions
On me like some angry harbinger
Of sadistic justice.
And I get out of the bed,
And I eat the same breakfast
That I ate the morning before.
And I take a shower,
And put on the same clothes
I wore two weeks ago.
And when my father’s gone
And my mother’s in the shower
Now,
I go outside to the dead back porch,
Or the deck,
And I smoke an aged Marlboro Red cigarette,
Plain and simple,
All the way down,
Past the filter’s edge
Until all that’s left is dust.
And I go back inside,
And my mother’s still in the shower,
So I lay there in my bed,
Same time,
Every time.