A freight train bellowed from faraway over shreds of cold sunset.
Homes and cars in this tight valley
have become grounded reminders of stars.
Let me be the first to fall into sleep under white November bedclothes, for I have seen too much today
to hope to rise into livid evening.
My century is oppressively chimerical;
its gaudiness is mistaken for radiance.
I am a son among a million bewildered sons who haunt quiet, productive afternoons.
Let me be the first to fall into sleep for I have seen too much today.
—Marc Awodey