Sleep creeps and gnaws at the edges of the brain
Banging incessantly on the locked doors of the mind.
Enraged and Delirious,
The brain bangs back,
as would a scolded child locked in their room.
Teetering on the brink of drowsiness, the eyes root for the mind,
Lids and lashes reaching towards the black ceiling,
Searching for anything interesting the egg-shell white paint has to offer.
After hours of fighting, the brain and eyes find themselves pinned to the floor,
Darkness mockingly counting as would a wrestling referee:
“One,
Two,
Three,
They’re down!”
Silence rings loudly in the ears,
And the Moon,
the only witness and audience member,
Rises higher in the sky.
Poetry
This poem about nostalgia and the loss of childlike innocence was written for my English class in junior year. We were studying Brooklyn poet Tracy K. Smith, and for this assignment we were meant to write a poem inspired by the line “What a profound longing/I feel, just this very instant/For” from her poem Garden of Eden.