Insomnia Poem

(for Todd Colby)

I’m like some freak who smells like moon tea, if only spirit
had not abandoned me, if only I could harness the power
of a single day’s frittering, I’d come back from the fourth dimension
and tell myself deep truths from there, flickering in the doorway,
saying, “Chill” and “Recognize.” I am high up in my home, bereft
of as many comforting textiles as I’d like to own, but rich in dark
haunted tree limbs moving of their own volition. Cradled
by more encroaching fog and nefarious 2 a.m. subway track
singing than I even begin to deserve. I am mourning the twentieth
century. Kids these days know nothing of Magic Fingers,
of luminous clock faces slowly going dark next to twin beds
as a dogwood tree comes on outside, shining the yard
bright in one spot, on the loneliest night in the twentieth century.