THE NIGHT RELIES
Beware the ones who fear the night.
We ghosts, Athena, Allah, Christ
will take our place in the dark and fuse
the father, the mother, the mountain, the muse.
In sleep, we have no face to lose.
What’s left is vague and sways the morning.
The camouflage is in conforming.
By noon we choose another word,
another myth, a lighter bird.
Between the train and bustling station
the human side of this equation:
when bathed by day or when in dream,
you are not you, nor who you seem;
the sum of what you think you’ve heard
will galvanize and will insist
a life will change inside the turn,
the night relies on what you’ve kissed—
the womb, the moon, the dream, the myth,
the rain, the dusk, this rising mist.
—from Rattle #46, Winter 2014
Rattle Poetry Prize Finalist
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Wendy Videlock: “I think I am a devotee of poetry in large part because it refuses paraphrase, has little interest in good manners, and doesn’t have a dress code.” (website)