Why We Sleep
        Vacation rental, Inverness, California

              Because almost all the stew of spring
vegetables is gone; because only a spoonful of the homemade yogurt
              brought from home remains; because
the fire is burning down, and the visitors have left on their long
              drive back to the city; because
we have looked through every one of the pile of new books
              on the table, and the words
in the ones we are reading are running together; because the lights
              are going off across Tomales Bay,
and the land beneath us is floating quietly, and the coals fall
              in the grate and the house
grows still, waiting for us to lie down in our unfamiliar beds;
              because no cats come to us
with questions and demands; because even some flowers have closed
              their eyes, and the apple blossoms
are resting; because the bakers are already sleeping so they can rise
              at four to make our morning pastries;
because the fish are dreaming under the water, eyes open, rocking
              in the incoming tide; because
our days ebb and flow like the tides outside these windows; because
              we are practicing for death
in the midst of life; because the earth is carrying us, like a great boat,
              toward the sun;
because the sun waits for us on morning's shore.

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Copyright © 2017 Carolyn Miller All rights reserved
from Route 66 and Its Sorrows
Terrapin Books
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission