The light bleeds through the window
like a memory of light.
Under its pale caress
familiar things remember themselves -
the bedpost, the chair, the vase of bittersweet -
they remember their shapes, if not
their colors.
He lies on his side, his arm
stretched across the bed, his palm
facing up. When he is like this,
still half-asleep in the dim bedroom,
he sometimes can believe
that his hand is not his own. This
brings him some comfort.
As does the frosted click
of the front door's latch and the necessity
of hats and scarves and gloves.
The crow in the bare branches
looks for all the world
like a piece of black cloth, caught
and fluttering. A shred of a nightmare
torn from his sleep. But he is out
in the dawn now,
as the gap between hills and cloud
fills with a yellow light, a draining
wound. He begins to imagine
what it will be like,
to be emptied thus.
* * *
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