Insomnia
Cradling a head, the down pillow says, I am the attic of the bed, and
turning & tossing the head says, I am the attic of the body. The
pillow says it’s stuffed with all the incarcerated feathers’ memories
of how the firmament feels. And the head says, I’m crammed to the
rafters with this body’s thwarted desire to fly. The pillow says, I’m
a gulag, and I think guards are as much prisoners as inmates. The
head says, Keep singing that daft little lullaby. Maybe then I’ll fall
asleep and dream this body into the air for a moment. And the pillow
says, Just remember: the guards keep coming back to prison over
and over. But the head is snoring. The pillow wonders if a sky’s
shining inside there now.
Landon Godfrey is the author of Second-Skin Rhinestone-Spangled Nude Soufle Chiffron Gown (Cider Press Review. 2011), which was selected by David St. John for the Cider Press Book Award, and the limited-edition letterpress chapbook Spaceship (Somnambulist Tango Press, 2014). Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Slice, Bombay Gin, The Collagist, Broadsided, Best New Poets, and Verse Daily. Her short fiction has been published in Waxwing. Also an artist, she is coeditor, co-publisher, and co-designer of the letterpress broadside journal Croquet.
