I'm too tired

I close my eyes, just for a little bit,

like scraggly blinds falling

I'm too tired

I let the book, suddenly so heavy,

fold itself

over my nose,

smelling Helen Macdonald's

H Is For Hawk

A nocturnal rain speaks calmly

through the fresh air crack

left open in the balcony door

The garden opens its mouths wide

and drinks voluptuously

from the clouds

The ripple at the pond

mixes

with the ripple from the rain,

at the opposite side

from Dylan's fire crying in the sun,

but similarly

Orchids are getting ready

at the roadsides

of Northbothnia

Individual lives

meet individual deaths,

all orderly marked

with dates of demise, small crowds

and a few words

The living are forced to breathe

Their brains go on thinking,

helplessly

Most dead folks become dust and soot

Some choose to rot

I lift the book off my nose,

open my eyelids,

feel a streak of cool night air

from the great outdoors,

and continue reading

about Mabel, the hawk

Nothing behaves very well,

but the rain is reassuring,

lets our bodies rest

beside one another

in The Great Ship Of Dreams

upstairs;

two human bodies out eight billion...

The Universe stares in awe

at itself,

soon through the James Webb telescope

The Cosmos is fighting

to keep its head above unconsciousness

Evolution leaves the last line unwritten: