What cranial pillow-deep tows
my skull over the headboard
down into some unnamed hematoma
of sleep, a back-flip in the pool
where the shelter of trees grasp
the air that divides their knotty
fingers, lingers overhead
in the up-stares where eyes
roll backward, reluctant
to let go of the animation
of awareness?
Gasping, I rise
only to sink,
a stone on its final
skip.
© Jilly All Rights Reserved
Posting on Open Link Night at dVerse.
The October edition of Casting Bricks to Attract Jade, collaborative poetry challenge, opens Friday, October 6th. Everyone is welcome to join in ! ~Cheers! Jilly
Jilly's 
What a heavy poem… insomnia is to really live with darkness in your veins.
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Thanks, Bjorn. I have been drawn to the topic lately. Makes for enigmatic poetry.
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An apt title for a heavy topic, Jill. I like the slow pace of it, like wading in water. and the little second stanza illustrates the stone on its final skip. Nicely done!
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Thanks! Making that small stanza separate was an after-thought that worked for the emphasis.
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The imagery here is slow. I can just about follow the trajectory of the stone. Love it.
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Thanks, Vivian!
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You’re welcome!
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Oh dear! Given my advanced years, I identify with the “stone on its final skip” … a brilliant phrase.
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Thanks, Bev! The whole experience of this is like a skipping stone that sinks back into sleep at the end of the gasping jolt into wakefullness.
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So clever – I love how the dream’s images intrude even while the narrator is complaining and then the breathless running together of images taking you down: ‘sleep, a back-flip in the pool / where the shelter of trees grasp / the air’ Terrific stuff.
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Thanks, Peter! There is a fine line between sleep & dream states and waking, and I have been struggling to find adequate words for it.
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Your poem speaks the nightmarish tale of sleep out of kilter. “…tows / my skull over the headboard / down into some unnamed hematoma / of sleep….” Your words dance darkly what it feels like to have your rhythm thrown off. Good one, Jilly! 🙂
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Thanks, Charley! It is an intriguing subject for poetry.
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Yeah, but you made me look up your title. I would have remembered it sooner or later. …with a little sleep, perhaps.
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HA! zzzzz
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As a longtime sufferer from insomnia, I can totally relate to this. Usually I am up reading or walking about outside.
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It’s a lonely thing to feel like the whole world sleeps while you are awake.
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Well written.
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My goodness! The imagery here is so palpable.. I can almost follow the trajectory of the stone.
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Thank you so much!
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This sounds so much like the state between insomnia and final sleep when the brain is convinced it’s still awake and being murdered, drowned or whatever.
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That is exactly it! Thanks, Jane.
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I’ve had enough of it to recognize some of the symptoms 🙂
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Enjoyed the evocation of dreams / insommnia / deep sleep.
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Thank you for your kind comment!
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A Poetic haibun! And a symphony of images centered on insomnia! How can I not love this?
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Wow, Frank, your comment made me go back and look at what I wrote. The Japanese forms seem to elude and baffle me at times and I hadn’t thought of this one as fitting that. That pleases me more than I can tell you! (Doing my end-zone dance!!)
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I liked the last four lines describing sleep as the final drop of a stone skipping on the water.
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I appreciate your insight, Frank. That is exactly what was meant by those last lines!
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This is horrible. Horrible in it’s accuracy. The sleep of no sleep. Makes me shudder.The sinking stone for me is that point when having struggled to sleep all night you give up, fall asleep and miss your alarm call.
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Oh how true! Appreciate your reading, Paul.
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Reblogged this on Frank J. Tassone and commented:
#Haiku Happenings #4: Jilly’s poetic #haibun!
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Wow, that was great. And then the last line, just, running, out, of… skips…
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🙂 Thanks! Like how you slowed…down…your…comment. Exactly my intention.
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