I’m stalling around waiting for the moon
to awaken you – you there asleep on the couch –
hands prayer-folded on a sternum-splayed book,
savoring your delicious first-sleep,
knowing I will glide you into our bed – you,
early riser of the chipperest sort,
such as strikes horror into the dark-
feathered breasts of night owls like me.
We’ve set up a ritual pattern which, judging
by the soft sighs rising from the sofa,
serve to sing you back to the possum sleep
of childhood, when your father carried you
from the backseat of his ’58 Chevy
at the end of a day in a park by the river
to settle your tender spine safe
against a familiar mattress.
The whole moon has cleared the cedars now
and I’m trying to point it out to you
on our four-legged limp past the tall window,
but you are lost to the other side –
moonless, starless, sunless – to the heavenly body
of our night-canopied bed.
