When I lay me down

to sleep, maybe forever, found

in dark blankets, pillows,

folds of skin around me

do I know what lurks where

I can't go, down there in that moist place?

And what if it's no more

than a salamander, some slime, or

stink I've seen many times before?

If not forever, let me rest

till I'm better, at my best,

my head lain quiet on your chest.

Bea is a woman and

I mean WOH-man

with curves aplenty,

with vast pants and

vast plans.

Her kitchen floor

is cleaned by me,

thanks be to a check

where she writes my name

down, still misspelled.

Down the shelves,

dust bunnies hop into cloth

suiciding at the smell of lemon:

Bea, I pledge to keep

your books to shine.

Evident she reads:

I spell out down the line

with titles like

Sensual Massage and

matching CD, Understanding

Your Fibromyalgia,

Understanding

God, My Name is Red,

Three by Annie,

every poem Collins wrote,

people he read,

dead people, sick people.

When we first began

she told me, Once a month,

she dates someone,

sheepishly.

Through the internet.

Come later this Sunday.

Chris and I like to sleep in

on Sundays.

Her back door unlocked

I make sure to knock

in case they are naked,

full and waking.

This morning her man

walked out without,

de-shirted, left tiny hairs

on the bathtub tiles, and

her laugh was round.

Fearing Dark.

sometimes I look at wooden boards,

the siding, ripped by wind

chipped off by dried bird shit.

In the dark the marks are invisible.

The city dims. So do voices:

they recede into ivy plants

the green turned a deep navy blue,

shiny. Maybe Benny the homeless

rock man polishes them in daytime

In the wee hours they shout

into our iron-wrought window:

THE TIME HAS COME...

what is he saying? Is he crazy?

WE ALL MUST SEE WHAT IS NEXT.

LOOK FOR THE COMING OF IT.

I pick deep, black berries,

hundreds of them, that disappear

with disappearing fragments of sun,

until the thorns hide rustles of raccoons

and shadow people drinking beer.

I wake up in the morning, fall asleep

at night. It is the only thing to do.