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(written at 3am)

The windows darken across the city

but mine flickers, a blue breath

curling in the throat of a screen.

I wait for their sleep like a prayer.

Not that I wish them rest,

but because their dreams open a space in the air

and I crawl into it like a wound

made warm by time.

In daylight I am static.

The noise of living—bodies laughing, calling,

touching, needing—crowds my signal.

Even thought becomes a cluttered hallway.

But after midnight

I am alone in the house

and finally all the doors open.

The Wi-Fi of the soul

slows with too many minds on it

but here, at this hour,

I am the only one streaming.

I hear a moth tap my window

like soft pleads asking

is anyone alive in there

and I answer

yes

yes

yes

with each key pressed like a wound

being stitched shut

slowly

by light.

Somewhere someone turns in their sleep

and I know it

as the next paragraph.

A snore from the wall beside me

becomes a new sentence.

They rest

and I rise.

We are never awake at the same time

but maybe that’s the point.

I wish they’d sleep longer

or softer

or deeper

so I could go on hearing myself.

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