The Only Star
by Jonathan Duckworth
Rolled up in my sheets,
marinating in nervous sweat,
brain a flipbook:
speed-painted images, words, phrases
like ticker tape rolling on & on.
I watch the crescent moon
steadily sheathe its blade edge
in a neighbor’s chimney.
Alarm clock says “4 AM.”
Hypothalamus says “Fuck this.”
If I got out of bed now,
I’d be like a half-forged moth
hulled too soon from its cocoon—
stunted, wingless, crawling, soft
meat for the world to devour.
Now
dawn takes wing
from its silver nest
behind the eastern slash pines,
plumed in slivers of
misted pink glass.
I do my best to hate
the sudden splendor
of this,
the only star of trillions
that keeps me alive.
