Somewhere Deep in Your Eye

Somewhere deep in your eye
a mangy beast has burrowed
A tear’s thin trickle of sweat
ran into your short dreams
into the ones just before waking
the ones that stay remembered
like an instant from nineteen years ago
that mean nothing, and in them you recognise
neither the bend in the road, nor the trolley in the shop
nor the tree in September
nor where the road is going
and somewhere from deep in the eye
the beast stretches toward the eyelids
and claws at them with its mangy tail
You wake, you come awake and dream again
those little things from dream to dream, which
you dream while you are still drowsy
the little things that make a life
and turn the car around
from dream to dream
the little ones that mean nothing to others
and you don’t remember them
not in the evening, not in the morning
each time you start from scratch
the same dream again, and then over a different coffee
the same dream again over a different cigarette
the same dream, and the chair is different in the light at dawn
the same dream
you squeeze it for an instant under your eyelids
until the beast of day devours it