12:43am

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12:43am

The water glass is cool, resting on 
    the bedside table beside the silver lamp
        and all the empty cups of nights gone by. 

But you are warm, the skin along your spine
    condensed with sweat as once again you twist
        around, convulse and throw yourself against

the covers, leaning to spill your dinner in 
    the can you placed beside your pillow in 
        anticipation. And somehow here am I, 

a shirtless, breathing body lying in between 
    the source of life and gutturals of death, 
        staring at the ceiling fan, my breath

in rhythm with the circling wooden blades—
    and caught, perhaps at heart like all of us, 
        prostrate in the middle of the two, 

a hand on one and thinking of the other. 

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