Insomnia (and other poems)

Insomnia
     for my son Ben

Startled from dreams, anxious, I glance outside
To check if that pale glare across your window
Signals you’re still awake. But wait, you’ve gone
Back to your summer job, just yesterday.

Earth and the green horizon curve. From here,
I can’t discern Manhattan, that great bright
Ocean liner moored to its granite dock, held
Fast for an aeon, tugged by the gray Atlantic.

There is your modest cabin, ten storeys up,
Perched on the northwest corner. Is your light
Still on? Or rocking in that rise and swell,
The hawser’d city-ship, are you asleep?




The Tallinn Ferry

The ferryboat from Helsinki to Tallinn
Passes small islands into the open sea,
...