Classic Poem

When there is none to heal it,
Nor numbèd sense to steel it …
— Keats
Everyone’s asleep: the house
is breathing deeply, lucky house.
Your eyes: jags of sensation,
unlucky, insomniac,
the living room a forest of snags
around the lake you wish was there.
Your mind says boredom, a little sleep
Your body says sleep, a little death
If you could walk out of yourself
and be a thin gray shadow
sliding quickly
over all the surfaces, goodbye!
No rest, no waking slow,
just the feel of feeling it,
the wading through,
thick world without end.
Soon the sun: messenger
with news you’ve already read.
And the others waking easily
with all their good mornings,
such strange companions now
arriving in another language.