Somehow you’re awake. You got wrapped up in a book,
science fiction, detailing vast sojourns across galaxies,
sleek stellar ships and strange creatures,
and now the day’s arriving. A swarm of comets

brushes the top of the sky.
Birds return to songs, as if thumbing pocket hymnals;
they spread wings and tremble
over branches the color of palimpsest,

rustle leaves that hang loose from bindings.
You feel the hush of a monastery.
Stars continue to fall. Though they’ve formed,
flown, melted and burned bright

reaching the atmosphere, is there still some flair
common to each? Together, they spin in a pinwheel
that disappears when the sun brings its eye
to bear. The hottest flame, when it reaches your skin,

kindles a desire to read it all.
But you bring your own book
every time you come out alone
amidst the glowing galaxy

to see the bursting atom-clustered lights
suggest their distances.
This book hugs a shift of black silk over your face,
and though you say you fear to close it,

you do, wondering what the birds are twittering.
Can someone or some thing in this confusion ask
the firmament to gather all
its swarms of falling pieces?

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