The same script each time you attempt to write it.
Setting: morning, in bed
and not having yet awakened,
the sound of distress from the tragedy
your body has created and believes,
with such conviction,
making its way out of your throat.
Never quite arriving, caught
by the mouth. Cheeks still dry.
Something like a well, pushing
the one prolonged cry out
to break against today’s clarity.
Or perhaps it did escape, continually,
as thin and unheard as a spirit,
that sadness so complete it seems
to be a warning to the waking self.
To brace itself — that it can be
destroyed momentarily
even within its own walls.
Even under the peace of sleep.
mabel lee 