We fell asleep at just a little past 7am,
Each with our phones pressed firm against our
ears
Huddled under blankets
In separate rooms
In separate homes,
In separate suburbs;
Yet closer than we’d ever been before,
And as morning light
(that was not soft,
And did not creep)
Sternly bashed its fists against the panes of
our windows
Like some stepfather half asleep and woken
By the laughing of a child that is not his with
Reprimands as consequence
Reprimands as consequence
For bliss;
We did the only thing we could
And drew ourselves as deeply as we should
Not have dared
Into the silence of each other.
Unable
Or unwilling to hang up we
Wrapped ourselves into the warmth of a coiled
‘Yes.’
An understanding as profound as it was
Sudden as it was
Bewildering as it was
True;
Each the other’s silent witness to the blooming
of intent,
Each the other’s silent guard
Against that effervescent ‘Yes’
We listened desperately
To the silence of each other
Were borne swift into the presence
Of a thing so deep
We dared not name it;
And so instead
We laid ourselves to sleep upon it
Made ourselves an ally of it,
Cursed our future friendship by it
And hoped it would not vanish
Into the silence of each other.
For four hours of that drunken morning
Words flew from our lips
As natural as bats spilling out the mouth of a
cave,
Agitated from their roost
By some inner sense of change
Unfurling onto the night like lamplight
Pooling in the unclean pores of a Friday night
fist fight,
Like we,
Drunk and careless,
And lighting up the world with the suddenness
Of the knowledge
That we exist
In the eyes of each other.
And I remember, you said,
Something like “Tell me something special,”
And I replied, sleepily,
“What would you like to know?”
So you said,
“Read me something that you wrote.”
We fell asleep at just a little past 7am
And I knew that was the time
Because my phone suddenly vibrated
And I thought
“Who would call me now but
who I'm already talking to?”
who I'm already talking to?”
And so I looked
“My alarm just went off
Telling me to wake up.”
And you replied,
“Why would you want to wake up now
When sleeping is as good as this?”
When sleeping is as good as this?”
We fell asleep at just a little past 7am
And four hours later I awoke
Still with the phone pressed against my ear
And I thought
“My God I hope it's not true about mobile phones and radiation.”
And then I listened
And I could hear
You breathing
And the sunlight which was never streaming
Now past the point of being stern
So brilliant in its reaming
Of our coalescent yearn
Made my room as freezing hot as the desert
In the middle of the day
But yet I could not tear myself away
From the silence
In between your breaths.
I couldn’t move, I couldn’t jest,
I could only laugh,
Wholeheartedly
Irrepressibly taken by the understanding of Yes.
And then you woke up,
And the first thing
The only thing you said was,
“Did I snore?”