Morning Person A
pretend you are Morning Person A.
nobody needs to know your insomnia,
baby kicking your armpit, your sheep
count, tooth-cracked dreams. fold
cardboard into larger cardboard,
as if daytime purchasing will not,
in the end, condemn us. kitchen-stalk
the dawn. there will always be distance
between us because i believe in miracles.
who said that? in what lifetime did you
have conversations like this? the almost-
memory hangs woolen in your brain.
dumb-eyed sheep! are you looking
forward to dying? tally your 3 shepherd-
children. it sounds a bit restful,
you probably said, sometime, long
ago, to that woman you met on the T.
one of those random fastenings
of strangers that happens once in a blue,
non-covid moon. she had looked tired
and sheepless. underground, you whispered
fears to each other like sunlit souvenirs.
fiery little sheep. you told her that when
you held M’s hand while she was dying,
the bathroom door at hospice kept opening
on its own, motion-sensored light
illuminating her toes in 10 second intervals.
oh, it’s a faulty latch, the nurse finally said.
been doing that all week. as if to say,
other people have died too, are dying
all the time. a family of the dead. but you
were not there, holding a clammy hand,
recounting memories at twilight,
because you had moved away,
were on another continent, day
was night, and the sheep looked more
like crows. are you still pretending
everything will turn out okay? the children
cocooned in their sweet-mouthed sleep,
flying through still-green meadows
on legs made of air? do you take
a sheep by the hoof and whack
its head on the toaster? no, no, no,
you do not. you pet the cats.
you domesticate your animals,
stories, heartaches. you moonlight
as Morning Person A.
nobody needs to know your insomnia,
baby kicking your armpit, your sheep
count, tooth-cracked dreams. fold
cardboard into larger cardboard,
as if daytime purchasing will not,
in the end, condemn us. kitchen-stalk
the dawn. there will always be distance
between us because i believe in miracles.
who said that? in what lifetime did you
have conversations like this? the almost-
memory hangs woolen in your brain.
dumb-eyed sheep! are you looking
forward to dying? tally your 3 shepherd-
children. it sounds a bit restful,
you probably said, sometime, long
ago, to that woman you met on the T.
one of those random fastenings
of strangers that happens once in a blue,
non-covid moon. she had looked tired
and sheepless. underground, you whispered
fears to each other like sunlit souvenirs.
fiery little sheep. you told her that when
you held M’s hand while she was dying,
the bathroom door at hospice kept opening
on its own, motion-sensored light
illuminating her toes in 10 second intervals.
oh, it’s a faulty latch, the nurse finally said.
been doing that all week. as if to say,
other people have died too, are dying
all the time. a family of the dead. but you
were not there, holding a clammy hand,
recounting memories at twilight,
because you had moved away,
were on another continent, day
was night, and the sheep looked more
like crows. are you still pretending
everything will turn out okay? the children
cocooned in their sweet-mouthed sleep,
flying through still-green meadows
on legs made of air? do you take
a sheep by the hoof and whack
its head on the toaster? no, no, no,
you do not. you pet the cats.
you domesticate your animals,
stories, heartaches. you moonlight
as Morning Person A.
Sept / Oct 2023
Jennifer Garfield is a poet and teacher in the Boston area. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in numerous journals, including The Threepenny Review, On the Seawall, Passengers, One Art, and Frontier. She is the recipient of multiple awards including an Illinois Arts Council Literary Grant, a Sustainable Arts Foundation Grant, and a Renaissance House Residency.
Art: Cam Pietralunga. Obfuscation of ... . Acrylic on canvas.