Poetry is what comes clearly in the night
when sleep is elusive. So as not to
disturb my sleeping partner, in half light,
I write, discard some words like unwanted
shoes or too-tight clothing unzipped
when no one is looking. The act of
peeling can leave you bare and clean,
remove unnecessary layers of
trivia, resolve encrypted meaning
What is left in the morning light
could be just a scrabble of floor-tossed
letters or even the first four lines of a
sonnet that’s been corseted all night.