Like Kafka

To wake in the late evening
from some foggy place
      I've been, my thin legs

swept above me like blown
twigs in fading wind.
      It seems a murky eon

since I crept to some dim
work I can't recall, eyes
      blinking into mist. It's

been a strange long Sunday
flung on my tender hump
      in bed. The last time

that I squirmed to rise
in pangs of gut-cold
      shame, I slipped against

bare wood and knocked my
head. Then even the gaunt
      charwoman, rough joker

that she is, rushed
heedlessly toward the
      door—hoarse-wheezing

between chuckling and
fear. Yet now I spend each
      foggy day too frail

to squirm or worry more,
gazing blind to hope
      or wrath, more free

than glum at last! Peering
with some mindless calm
      from my chitin ark

upon a slyly opening
and closing
      door.

Copyright © 2008 Dan Stryk All rights reserved
from Chelsea
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission