An Ode to the Journey to Sleep

Illustrated by Ella Clayton.

Eyes shimmer shut,

encrusted with cow-thoughts of the day,

the blanketing darkness descends as a thunderstorm

over a small town, some Midwest dust-belt town

of which purple thoughts populate and shudder

through its drowsy streets; drift from boulevard to boulevard,

stretching the sticky cloth of binding umbra,

of bellows in the night, of

silent figures on a

silent street under a

silent sky.

I feel perforated by this yawning dread and so

I trudge down to the river, smiling politely to the juddering men. Death

reclines in his boat, smoking a calceous cigar and counting the hours

till dawn

on stick-insect fingers.

The thrummering black oozes synaptic fuzz,

vague ghosts from the waking day, 

silly intestinal hopes and regrets and loves,

squeezing down your grinning oesophagus like a sockful of porridge.

The starlight ripples

and folds

under a moonbeam attention.

Writhing. Withering.

Maybe like some curious oneiric jaguar nuzzling through the smoke.

Well,

maybe not like a jaguar.

Like a vine from fire, whipping, tightening, thrashing and dashing

my dozy skull against the glass

so the midnight purple leaks out and joins

the throng marching down the silent street

to the river of death.

From between my prised eyelids

fill my head with dream and breath and nothing.

Slip me off to the ephemeral death,

    slip me off to the welcome death

        that goes skittering off a rainbow fractal

                of nonsensical whimsey,

whimsical nonsense,

incessantly honing in like a kaleidoscope;

An oil spill spattered by a bloody rock on the tarmac.

One day, your figure will buckle and roll up and glide

down into the slick depths, drowning in satisfied relief.

Death laughs a mirthless laugh, riverslime

glooping between chattering tombstone teeth,

and continues working his xylophone spine back and forth.

Shapeless figures parade along the bank to watch,

velvet dripping velvet drops.

I gaze out at the chorus on the shore,

clamp wispy fingers under my chin.

Going to sleep was always my favourite.

I smile a nodding smile,

and Death smiles back; I don’t think he can help it either.