One Hour of Sleep by Any Means Necessary

the first time i realized my neighborhood

finally began to change color,

i felt it was safe enough to walk out in the open,

without windshields…

i was moving with a tuned voice in my ears,

eyes closed

to see the next step dive away,

disappear from the print left before it

and when we met,

she was wearing a long fur coat

to keep her heat from escaping

we were grateful there was some chance to satisfy this night

without inventing reasons we chose to walk away,

once,

long before

partially hidden by too much light,

a cellar room eventually remembered us

as the stone building circled our approach,

and though whatever i remember still remains covered in sticky dream,

it all happened every minute ago

upon entering, the pair emptied their torn pockets on a table

above frozen bodies spilled across the floor,

one staring wildly at the holes in my shaking knees

the other busy combing her bald head

with what was left of her bitten fingernails

my mother suddenly entered the room

carrying a sinkful of blood for us to bathe in,

humming one of her Broadway tunes,

thinking it best to introduce us to what was left of this moment together

III

meanwhile, the girl with the fur coat

began slicing up the table,

gathering wood to burn away the oven

and as I wondered if it was time to put the house lights on

to make sure my mother's reflection was still alive,

the young girl without fingernails

took out a flashlight and began searching the ceiling for a hole

for us to lie down in

(she must have realized that it was time

she began to be aggressive)

a third girl stared madly all the while

at the holes in my knees,

where she must have found something very religious to pray about

perhaps it was the dense fog

coming to put her to sleep,

but the fans were working to well

for any air to escape from this,

her cold celebration

now the room was touched

with only a saddened monotone voice

murmuring about a past year of truth and innocence,

but i could hardly understand the language her voice used

because we were now living in different countries-

she could not know that while she was growing older and more uncertain

i had only since learned to breathe

without my mouth inside hers,

and for this she could not live another day

knowing a sullen rain would be invented to fall on us

the young girl told me she still could not experience

the christ that lived within her youth, the image of which

she knew still reflected strongly in my eyes-

there was no way to speak openly to

of what i was certain to be true,

for it was too late for resurrection

the day for sympathy had ended long ago-

here only real people remained

the little girl's sad eyes closed for a short moment

while she folded her hands in prayer- this ended the waiting,

and quickly my knees dissolved

under the gaze of the third girl,

who at last ripped off her jade necklace,

began tying it into little knots,

and threw it wildly at my drowning feet

causing the floor to divide in thirds

VII

the girl in the fur coat,

oblivious to the obvious,

was now stretched across my bed

fingering a harpsichord

reciting passages from Keat’s “Ode to a Nightengale”:

she had to use her heat in some destructive way,

and strumming "poetic" was a lot better that digging for the ruins

of some ancient Assyrian king…

VIII

just then,

a grinning messenger flew in through the window

with a note for me:

“the root farm is being occupied by the Brown Army”,

and I “was being sought for stealing some apples”

i had picked from a tree near the North Pole!

i sat deliberating, overcome by the speed this message had translated itself,

but was not quite sure if anyone had read it over my shoulder

just them alarm clocks splattered onto the floor.

windows in the next rooms flew open

causing the air supply to completely vanish,

and the holes in my knees filled,

causing the third girl to suddenly jump back

into a memory from which she was born from

i sang out in astonished harmony

unlikely to conceive the lyrics any longer

over on the bed the sheets were bunched way up over the draping,

clearly all would be obliterated

after the next tidal wave smashed against the growing darkness.

i thought it was the heat pipes struggling,

but purple tears commenced pounding from the little girl’s wavering eyes:

“come and win another horse race for me”, she begged seductively,

but it was clear i had to do all the running for myself

the tempest dominated all other human sounds,

and through an ever-nearing amber cloud

the time for the shooting had come

the girl on the bed

had already surrendered to the fever of the bloodbath,

my arching body flattened, pinning firmly against her:

how long would we be able to struggle

away from the drains?

XII

i edged down to the couch (near the smoking plants),

believing the worst was behind,

but the third girl had already mailed me back the necklace

with “Christ is the answer” for postage…

(two weeks would pass when i went looking for another dream to bury her remains in)

XII

finally the storm had reached its damp and violent climax

when i awoke,

trying to regain some clarity that lurked behind,

hoping to surmise some truth

from what had assembled along an opened wound,

but each abased and fading recollection

becomes morning mist

transitory dew,

consciousness burns away all clarity, and

truth,

now relative,

a fleeting perception,

impossible to believe in

XIII

three sisters

who once offered me intuition to augment my dreams of communication,

soon saw my work could not include

pursuing some other form of Musical Soul,

of which i am not,

and so one afternoon they arrived together,

one last time

unlocking the triangle vault

encasing their sleepy voices

XIV

leaving me to ponder:

why must important lessons remain left unopened,

discarded birthday presents

just out of reach,

after the jar has already spilled away all its captives?

11/20/68-11/24/68 from the dream on 11/18/68