One sunny aftr’noon I chose
To stroll upon the sound
When suddenly I glimpsed ahead
And saw, me, on the ground

This vaguest doppelganger mimick’d
Ev’ry move I made
It spun upon the sand and whirl’d
As I turn’d away

Than standing still, I crook’d my head
And look’d behind in shock
I saw my mimic laying there
As wrought and real as rock

But as the sun began to sink
And moon commenc’d to rise
My companion stretch’d as on
A rack, before my very eyes

I slep’t upon the beach that night
Awaiting its return
And awoke to feel the sand against
My face begin to burn

Still half asleep, I stumbled to
The bay to wash my eyes
And while splashing water on my head
I view’d to my surprise

My shadow spread across the sand
And glinting smoothen’d stone
Now in days of solitude
I know I’m not alone

He, lived with me, white man,
Dancing, skimming, swinging,
And his body overstretched on primroses!

On the dandelions he climed,
On the walls he skidded,
On the grass he slumped,
On the boughs he slep,
In my orchard, my guest!

With stealthiness-footfalls
He peeped in through windows,
And my drowsy-drunk body caressed!

He welcomed butterflies,
He whispered to birds, passing by,
He made my Bulbul, the nightingale, his buddy,
And lost in her mellifluous lyrics!

He hugged the world,
He hugged my soul too,
He loved apples,
He kissed the lilies!

Ah! Things are bound to farewell,
As time scratches their beauty,
And they slide into nothingness!

Oh! His journey is over,
He is going to the house of the moon!

Only I, with sobs smearing,
Is in the lawn to see him off!
O butterflies, O birds, O Bulbul,
Play the requiems,
Winter is going, dying,
Our friend is going, dying!

sa
yn
ota
wor
dor
)don


           'ts

a




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                 words
                     m
                   o
                    u
                   t
                    h(h
                        o
                           W)about
                          how
                            in
                        winter

                           slep
th
ard
ly a
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ourbody.but

(with a verb i
                    you
                    the aching
                    and all the birds
                    of a forest
                    
                    leapt

                       from





                          SLUMBEr



                          and rose






                          upon







                            the crimp

                            of darling youth





                             a flower,



                                 ,


                                          .



                               ,



                   ,



                                          .

evri dai weni *** hom i say ello too mi famulee
dey sai hii bak
i an prowd perent
if i hav mi 909t cild i well be appie

wen i goo to slep i drem of mi famelie
wre arr habingg a jood tiem
eeting luch in de prak
ssomany appy memores

For weeks, which felt like years, that small room was the whole World and every thing in it.
For days, which should have been their own, one linked and looped with the next and taught me to shame the sun.
After one week, I found out that a bed was like an aging body; the more it was used, the more I could feel its once-sturdy frame bend and sag, and the squeaking grew and the metal groaned below my sweating skin.
After two days, I found out that a bed was also the most dependable of life rafts, which safely kept me floating above the forever-blackening sea, where I’d once sworn I’d take my last wet and feeble breath.
While this one-room World swallowed fears and held trembling hands tight, it began to whisper in the night; one wall repeated rumors it heard from its opposite: warnings of the Outside and all the dangers it could bring.
“Those you pass on the road will stare with the knowledge that you are out-of-place, that you do not remember normal,” whispered the plaster on my right.
         "And the many men leaning in to corners of brick could yell or touch or chase, you don’t want that again, not again, right?” hissed the wall to the left.
        No, I do not want any of it, I replied through a hazy dream.
After their whisperings stuck, I discovered that the notion and act of sleep had the ability to slyly slip away, no matter how hard I tried to hold on.
         Sleep. Slep. Seep. Spl. Shut. Shh. Sleep? Silence. Close. Dark. Down…
When sleep became a habit of the past, anxiety became the habit of the present and the terror of the future.
For weeks, which were just one stretch of daylight, I did not know sleep, but I still knew the comforting space of World and the safety the floating bed wrapped around me.
For days, which were wholly lost and never found, alcohol seeped from my pores, while empty ***** fifths created new altitudes of the floor.
For months, which were truly months, I sat in the small World with depression’s darkness, and I found I could live with no real desire to see my toes touch the existent, dreadful ground.