I lie on my side and wait,
gather myself with my eyes
closed, tucking one hand
under one cheek to steady
it, a fist of hard breath held
against night. Courage comes
in little packets spilled out—
the saccharine never quite
sweetens the bitterness of
death, of night solitary and
deafening. I leave the light
on to cover its emptiness,
throw a canopy over it, a
globe blanketing the void
like the white sequined
low-cut gown which covers
my cold nakedness at grim
parties; a single bulb will do.

Published in Underground Window, May 2005