this is not here

i'm going to try to whisper someone awake, because i've been up since spring and i'm still too restless to sleep.  i'm going to take the remnants of a last memory, a stub of a cigarette, a necklace, and five tears i keep in a vial with honey and river water, and say all of my secrets until these things start to flare and ring and make sparks in the dark.  at the very least, these things will keep me protected, make me ready for the next war, keep my spine straight and my belly tight.  i'm going to try to speak the new myths into the mouths of virgin oracles, and hope that they get my present confused with the future that's ahead, because there might be blood, or there might be more crying, or worse, there might be memories of heartsweat on heartsweat, the kind that can make the most sun-soaked enchanted day grow pale in relief, and there might not be relief.  i'm taking out the wolves and the foxes and the wild dogs and let them just try to sleep by my bed, and when they get weary, i'll move my face so it's in line of their tongues, and let them just try to sleep, and when they are so drowsy they start to see stars inside the room, i'm going to feed them the tears and the honey and the blood, and let them start to tremble until they tell me new stories.  i'm going to bring the salt from the tears of mermaids who lost their heart's desire inside, on the back of my neck, already thick with white salt, so the visions of these dogs will have no choice but to sing me to sleep with the songs of the sea.  because i want to sleep but i'm afraid i'll miss a visitor at 3 am, and i won't hear her say my name in the dark in the sparks in the dark, but will only know she was there because she wrote my name on my back with her fingernails, while i was sleeping, while the dogs were sleeping, while the bottom of the sea talks to me, and tells me secrets that i will have to keep whispering, trying to whisper someone awake.