Nocturne

Midnight for the squirrels and the drunks,
midnight for you dear and your chest hair too,

put your pen down pet and rest here.
Midnight swallowing the mirror whole, swallowing

my mother in her pale blue slippers,
and my brother, my big brother in his too small bed.

Bed, the longed for stopped short sound delivering
us at last from sense-making. The trains

are empty, the magnolia trees are still, the tower block
has lost another dozen yellow squares but

they’ll fill up and we’ll fill too, and in tomorrow’s
morning we’ll awake, washed up again among

the bills.  Meanwhile, the stars are queuing up
to get behind your lids.  Come, give me your hand.