Insomnia

it is the inescapable duty of every writer to write something about insomnia, and about writer's block. this is my fulfillment of the former requirement.

outside my room

lived a mockingbird

who sang at three o'clock in the morning.

 

i was in music school in tennessee

and stayed awake with her countless nights.

 

i liked to think

her song was full of despair,

the loneliness of awakeness

at this desperate, transitory hour

 

and so i felt with her a certain solidarity

which i reserved for non-humans:

 

the love-eyed dogs

on strange leashes, the

fragrant exuberance of lilies,

a friendly beetle from the sky,

a raindrop caught brief on my eyelash;

 

but now, in alabama,

still unwittingly awake

as the crickets chorus softly,

 

i recall her exuberant liquid singing,

the joyful trills,

the improvised melodies twisting

upon each other, infinite variations,

songs she'd heard around her forever

and new songs spun instantly from the

golden threads of her own soul,

weaved in thoughtless ecstasy

into a hot brilliant braid, joyfully twisting skyward,

a song of the brilliance of creation,

a celebration of her glorious songbird existence,

crazily on and on, up and up,

without pause, without slowing,

tapping into an inexhaustible source,

as if compelled by that mechanism

which compels dogs to love,

and ferns to fractal and coil,

and trees to produce ten thousand flashing leaves,

 

and i recall for myself

the very occasional joy of aloneness,

the secret solidarity with god

(those were the only nights i believed in god),

spinning out bach-devised melodies

and then my own, in a practice room,

my own private joy

in the bedeviled hour of the night

 

and realize i may have misplaced

my feelings of companionship

 

 

and in fact

should not have been listening at all

Reviews

[Suhcej]

This is a good writing, I enjoyed reading the thoughts of the main character.
Keep writing.

[BrightEyes]

I have discussed insomnia with more than a few people. For yes, there are those days when I am dragging my butt around because of lack of sleep, but there is something about the night. I do not know why it becomes almost a freeing thing - odd really for it is not that I am less myself during daylight. Perhaps it is so simple as what you have captured here - that the rest of the world sleeps, and it is that ultimate in private time. There is such power in that last line - that thought that you should not have been listening at all. This becomes almost a tribute to insomnia in a sense, and a lovely one at that.

[Butterflymom]

This is an amazing, fun, and creative piece. Awesome, and orginal! Thank you so much for sharing this with us!!!!