Early Rising | Poem by Alvin Knox

 

 

Early Rising

(For Tom Watson)

 

An odd dream,

the kind from which you’re roused from REM

in the soft dark of predawn with the fleeting odor

of mint playing down a long unused synaptic corridor.

And you know it was somehow pertinent, has left you

stinging, like catching a fast ball with an oven mitt.

No.  You’ve just slept hard on your arm

and your hand has fallen asleep, the one you type with,

the one you write with, all pins and needles

in its own effort to rise.

What was it?  Something about ten long-haired midgets

squabbling over a tent in the low rent district of right field,

all shouting “Mine! Mine! Mine!”

But the sun is threatening the low hanging moon

and soon this horoscope of memory

will retreat into noon’s light.

Time now to return to reality,

to trim the trees, to pull the weeds,

to listen to a ball game and relax in the sun.

Time to contemplate the midgets

and capture, with your pen,

the giants in their shadows.

 

 

© Alvin Nash

Music by David Michael Jackson

A production of Artvilla Records

All rights reserved