Monday, October 30, 2006

Slept

What is beneath me on this

unmoveable night is years of

deer and elk and moose

trampling, bedding and being.

And I know now the satisfaction of my

pillow of fern my blanket of birch

my comforter of stars.

I’m allergic to feathers and polyester

but not to ferns.

Hay fever season hits hard

but not like the shock of never having slept

until I slept in Algonquin Park.

Cradled by the sounds of

scurrying animals, startled awake by falling branches.

I dream of the smoke and crackle of fire what warms one

side of my body and makes desire of the other.

The smoke sears my nostrils and makes me more

a man today and more a woman tomorrow.

© S.I. Shaw

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