A white room.
The sound and blur of a door closing, slamming shut.
Soft footsteps in the hall.
Wake up.
A bare bulb swinging from the ceiling shines.
Sunlight with artificial light blends strange.
No shadows in the hothouse room. Late summer, afternoon.
Gauze curtains floating in the breeze.
(Sleep, sleeper, sleep . . . there is no end to this.)
Wake up!
Dream movements underneath the lids.
Lips moistly murmuring, or seeming to; the room
as silent as a stone, the body still: entirely still
but for the gentle rise and fall of breath.
Float on, float over, float away . . .
The footsteps in the hall are gone. They never really were. A ball
of string unwinds along the shabby, dark-brown carpet, slowly
bouncing down the stairs. In total silence.
Please, wake up.
