asleep
asleep
My arm fell asleep
one night
and I wiggled my fingers
and then wiggled my hand
and then even my entire arm
yet numbness prevailed.
My heart fell asleep
one night
and I didn’t much care
about the starving children in East Africa
or the endangered whales in Western Alaska.
My brain fell asleep
one night
and I could no longer sort out
why I was here
or where I needed to go.
These tiny thin-tooth bedbugs bite at my body
munching on my toes,
pilfering fluids from my fingertips.
I stay awake itching
but itching only
makes the itching worse.
I, myself, somehow, finally fell asleep one night
and since then
I bounce from night
to night
forgetting everything
that happened in-between.
— Zumwalt (2011)
zumpoems 