Heavy eyelids struggling to remain
Open, while as quilts they prepare
To shelter drying miotic pupils,
Grand drapes shutting before the stage
Of reality.
A tarnishing moon mists the mind
Attempting to try, to content temperamental
Will, keeper of infantile caprices finding sleep
Deprived of purpose, obstinately fighting
Biological clocks to stay awake, reluctant
To take the risk of missing, a moment,
That special interval of time, when
Everything happens and adults whisper.
Time that could be spent, to see, discover,
Imagine, create, and as I speculate
On all the things I could do instead,
Itchy feet resolve on dragging me to bed.
Lying down resilient still, I scribble
These words until Morpheus demands
Of me to drop my pen, unwilling to wait
A minute more he kidnaps me like gods
In ancient tragedies to realms
Of dreams where everything that doesn’t
Happen here, happens there.
Endless possibilities flying out
Of a whimsical ivory box.
[Featured painting: Morpheus and Iris by Pierre-Narcisse Guérin, 1811]