Where the Sky Opens. Laurie Klein

past unspools, and earth lovers

      pause, gazing upward.

      Jealous

      Morning, with your pillowed hands

      twisting over the bed, do you envy

      human desire, its midnight hinge,

      covet our slack-jawed alpha waves

      morphing to REM and then

      a prance of neurons, an in-burst

      of the invisible? All those covert

      sleep spindles slowing the heart,

      cooling the body—yes, we are

      lapped ‘round with rest: one delta

      astride a deepening river, one dream

      richer than silt.

      Poor Great Ante Meridiem!

      Another graveyard shift, the looping,

      half-world commute—no wonder

      you snap the shade on its roller,