Saturday, April 7, 2012

BE (WHERE YOU ARE)


BE (WHERE YOU ARE)


When you are sleeping, sleep./ Be where you are..../ Don’t wonder when/
the bulb died. Fix it./ Or tell someone else to.
--- Hannah Stephenson, “Moondust”, The Storialist



Or why dream at all? You will kick the flannels
off, thrash the sheets, strangle faultless pillows,
moan or giggle between snores or wheezing, or
perhaps whimper your saddest fare-thee-wells
(goodbye-cruel-world sobbing), or call a name
you caught across a crowded room, some such.
Beware the nightmare lurking as a wan wraith
of your most cherished dreams: they will skew
reel-like slowmo runs through verdant meadows
into frenzied train-chasing pleas for love’s sake.

Either way, dreaming a nightmare into a haven
of glorious lifetimes, a plenitude of joy and love,
remains the refuge of the fearful and defeated.
Be where you are: warm, asleep, under flannels.



---Albert B. Casuga
04-07 -12

This poem, an experiment in  marrying  elements of a sonnet and sweetelle (a la Alison Joseph and Luisa Igloria), is our seventh in April (celebrating National Poetry Month). Thanks to Ohio poet Hannah Stephenson for her poem "Moondust" which triggered this poem-a-day effort.

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