poetry wakes me up as soon as the alarm goes off — jumps on my head with little clawed feet, coming dangerously close to my eyes
i hit the snooze and poetry lies on my chest, investing each molecule of its hot body with extra gravity
poetry wants me to wake up
and smell the coffee get out of bed go to the kitchen and see the sunrise paint the new leaves and grass a divine orange and violet with its warming breath
because poetry knows i’ve been sleeping my life away while the world turns again and again toward beauty
woke up with the clash singing should i stay or should i go in my dream soaked brain (vivid down to the dahlink guitar lick) and didn’t tweak to the heavy ideological and life resonances at first because as i stretched out and started to catalogue the kinks and knots that took me over during the night my right calf shivered and pulled tight began to cramp like a holy mother fucker so i had to stop breathing and singing and thinking while everything in me held its breath too until at last the crushing pain changed its mind and rolled away so that the clash could come back to say so come on and let me know —
what if no poems come to visit? what if we clean up the house, vacuum the cat hair and dust bunnies, even spray down the windows, and no poem arrives to drink our wine or eat our expensive cheese?
i’ve seen them strolling by around five, when the sun slides down to cast enormous shadows from their tiny feet.
sometimes they glance at me, safe behind my spotty glass.
more often, though, they keep their eyes straight ahead, as if seeing a real friend, waiting with open arms down the street.
