Two O’Clock

I lie in bed.

Night has settled in. Taken over.

Darkness flows into all corners,

laps all objects in its embrace.

I lie there.

A web of words,

whispering, wailing,

 insinuates itself

into my conscious, my unconscious

as I wait for sleep.

---

I look at my clock.

Luminescent numbers say it is two.

I wait.

I look again.

Blatantly the clock now tells me

it is three.

Or perhaps five.

---

Hopefully

I pull the quilt up to my nose.

Suddenly it’s seven.

There’s a click on the phone.

Daily news has come in.

The dark is no longer quite as dark.

Daylight is waxing.

Street lights are waning.

Diminishing.

Increasing.

---

A bark, breakfast, then a walk.

Slender young things legs encased in jeans

spill out of a bus,

head off for school.

It’s after eight.

---

Catkins litter the street

leading to the park

with its view of the valley

and the 12th-century abbey.

A cat looks nervously at the dog

who pays no attention.

Leaves, golden, litter the road

leading home.

---

It’s ten o’clock.

We’ve had our walk

and I my second coffee.

Sleep that had refused to raise its head

five hours ago

is now demanding to be heard.

---

Stubbornly resisting,

like the dog

who sits and doesn’t budge

when she wants to go left

and I want to go right.

I try to push back the fog

that slowly creeps in.

---

Two o’clock.

A short-lived splash of yellow,

brushwork of the sun.

A stop in its daily migrations.

And suddenly it’s three.

In our tug of war

Sleep is declared the winner.

---

But first

yesterday’s events pass by,

in a kaleidoscope of scenes:

nicking my thumb

in making slits on chestnuts,

a coin dropping to the floor

through a hole in my pocket,

my hearing aid flying off

as I comb my hair.

---

And then,

for an hour or so

I sleep as I should have

five hours ago.

Sleep has won out

and for me

night falls at noon.