Wake Me, Not
oh, love …
do you still dream?
pray so, find me here
and haunt me -
stab me with those beautiful,
bloodless lies -
I’ll believe it all …
til waking
there -
I sit, toes in cold sand
wishing on a gulf as wide as mortality
Sol, bright as bright
but no warmth
only a brume of miracles
puffed away by the chill breath
of what’s real
(and wild whispers, once yours)
yet, here -
I feel it all again … intensely
as if these lifetimes had not passed
as if your first smile “hello”
had just found me speechless
brown-eyed blonde magic
turning me a child -
splitting me like a log
heart, no longer my own
as true as truth when
I’m in this fantasy’s meandering
praying to slumber on
beg, these soft petals
of sleep’s flower
do not shed for the thorns of
the waking world
where I can not speak your name
or place my kiss upon your eyes
or drown their diurnal dark
oh, haunt me …
my love.
Copyright © Gregory Richard Barden, February 21, 2023
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