Incoming

The twitch begins behind my left eye,

the dusty one,

lazy in long hours.

Prepared to wait it out,

I gather myself

into shadow and sheet,

drinking in the firings of

each throb

and wanting

a deeper dark.

Finally I surrender to

those bending furls of purple

and lie with the music

of this clutter,

stilling the hurried rush of blur and trailer

into a settled space of gritty warmth.

Sleep dispels the brightness,

subduing it under a collapsing wooden dock

so that it settles down on its knees

in fishy mud,

browning away

from that shuddering muscle

of weakened sight.

I dream of thick glass,

old-world pirates

with eye patches,

and the gray tabby hand puppet I played with

when I was five,

the one with the rip in her left ear,

the one who heard

(and saw)

my stories.