Can't Sleep

Bill Garten

I go for a walk in my neighborhood at 2am with the flashlight of insomnia seeing other house lights on - computer and television screens through unwary windows.

A couple of teenagers kissing on a front door step surprised by my late night early morning wandering around listening to my music. Wires coming out of my ears like fishing lines

hooked I think about my earlier single malt scotch poured over a single ice cube - a transparent cinder block with no foundation for anything, other than to ease the consistent pain in my back.

I look up at the stars remembering the time my father took me out back late night on the patio, one of the few times when he did not beat me, he held me - pointed up at the sky right at Sputnik.

He whispered how space exploration was our future and how hopefully the Russians wouldn't win the race. Now sixty years later I am walking in the damn middle of the night, the stars like so many silver lures dangling

in the dark ocean sky, beautiful bait for all of us to swallow with our exploring mouths - so hungry for anything other than where we are.

Bill’s book, “Asphalt Heart” was published by The Main Street Rag in 2018 and its chapbook version was a finalist in The Comstock Review’s 2017 Jessie Bryce Niles Chapbook Contest. Bill is the winner of the 2017 Broken Ribbon Poetry Contest, is a Finalist in the 2018 Tucson Festival of Books Literary Awards for Poetry; the 44th New Millennium 2017 Awards.