In my Sleep

I close my eyes

For a slender sleep

But wake in sweat

To tangled nightmares

The one beside me moves

Looks at me and says

Why the slumber screams?

Are the nightmares back?

It’s happening again

The past, it haunts me

Visiting me in the night

Like restless hallucinations

The images won’t disappear

The pain still raw

The future all a blur

I just want to have peace

Sleep now, he says

Close your eyes,

Rest in my arms

I’ll rock you to sleep

I lie back,

I close my eyes

And I slowly drift off

Into a pleasant slumber

I wake up rested

But he is gone,

Was he ever there?

Or was I lost in lucidity?

Jo Anne Kennedy

October 2015