Bedtime
On nights when you and I are engaged in our companionable parallelism,And your task cannot be easily interrupted
When drowsiness begins to hijack my eyelids,
I'm quite happy to kiss you and wish you a good night,
And wander off to my bed alone.
But on those same nights,
The absence of your heartbeat next to me is noticed,
And the warmth of your arms sorely missed.
The soft notes of your voice and the pressure of your fingers,
Squeezing mine as I curl around your back while you pray
Are as much a part of my nightly ritual as the prayers are of yours.
And I find that Sleep comes more reluctantly,
Shy and uncertain despite the relentlessness
With which the Sandman had been pounding against the windows
Mere moments before;
As if he knows my day has not been properly completed.
Instead, my fatigue notwithstanding,
My mind lies awake for minutes or hours,
Like a child determined to see Santa before succumbing to the call of their dreams.
© mjc 17 October 2022
