the blueshift journal

He is reading in bed, his wife asleep.

High winds are tearing up the sky.

In the dark, before he sleeps,

 

unseen, he weeps. He has no one 

to be brave for. A tree, 

in another part of the city, 

 

uproots, destroys a house,

but the couple inside escapes 

without physical injury. Their story 

 

news on the radio next morning 

as he drives through town to work 

reeling in bits of last night’s dream: 

 

he’s alone in a boat, grounded 

on the back of a turtle streaked 

with blood. His father killed it, 

 

expects him to devour its flesh. 

Mark me like the tulip with thine own 

streaks, the Sufi mystic pleads.

 

The boat becomes a star 

looking down on him reading in bed.

His wife believes he is fearless.