Silent
The gathering dusk
flows into the room
Pooling on the floor
Flowing beneath
and around the familiar
Furniture
Filling the nooks . . .

Silent
In a silent house
Relenting at length
Fuzzing along the edges
I relinquish the Day

The scrunched pillow
The flowered throw
knitted by Mom
I reach into the cool dark water
and draw a handful into my mouth

The night air opens
the bow of my dream ship
slices through the hours
in search of dawn

Strange dream angels
come softly across the lake
The lights in their eyes
dance like tiny fires
upon the water
A breeze breaks the reflection
into a field of rubies

Night follows day
Day follows night
I am dreaming
Or am I waking?

I'm screaming through the night
at the speed of sound
Lost somewhere between the Earth and Sky
in a dream of steel and glass

The clouds water colored
in hues of pewter and white
The city lights sparkling
like diamonds strewn on black velvet

I am falling
I am swimming with
Fishes

Fishes in hobnailed boots
Stomping the cobble stones
In the harbor mists

Gasping
Cursing their foul luck

The whirling ebb of the tidal waters
carries many things onto the sand
Leaving them like offerings
leaving them like verses....

A shell
incomplete and broken in places
A piece of coral
a piece of leaf
A bottle without a note

Driftwood rubbed smooth
by the hands of time and tide
Sea weed flecked with foam
Rocks and sand

Streams of light
pierce the draperies
Is it morning already?

William C. Burns, Jr.