I put the song on YouTube-repeat
and listen to it for hours.

On the best nights I feel as if I’m
sleeping in diminutive rays
of luminous moon.

I try to keep the house as quiet as possible.
My cats turn into prowlers
stealing all that barely stirs

and still The Shins play on
through headphones.

Drunk and dying,
Amy Winehouse spent her last hours
watching videos of herself on YouTube

wondering, I think, how misery
comingled so easily with vodka.

Prayers leave contrails as they
exit the atmosphere

ejected by a persistence
of desperation
conflating with the vision
I cast upward.

Through sky and stagnant dreams
there is a gallows

of rock, ammonia and ice
hanging in suspension
as the billions
sleep peacefully, unknowingly below,

imagining into darkness
infinite loves that will never be.

# # #

Richard King Perkins II is a state-sponsored advocate for residents in long-term care facilities. He lives in Crystal Lake, IL, USA with his wife, Vickie and daughter, Sage. He is a three-time Pushcart, Best of the Net and Best of the Web nominee whose work has appeared in more than a thousand publications.

Photo credit: Dirk Dreyer  www.dreyerpictures.com