Often, when my mind precludes a night’s sleep,
I see Sam Shepard galloping alone
in the Mojave, the dusty, orange dusk
bathing him, his chiseled cheeks, an evening
wind parting his thick hair, as he follows
an endless sky, possibility, space.

I think of my basement rental, that space
small, our crisscrossed fingers drifting to sleep
as we watched—so cool how the plane follows
him upside down, breaking mach one, alone.
I’m sure I still see Shepard in evening
skies, flying like Yeager. Do you, too? Dusk

is to blame, how it can confuse and dusk
the memory. Maybe my brain lacks space
to parse the truth so late in the evening,
though ever since that movie, which could sleep
most people in its running time alone,
I feel like my word or thought mis-follows,

each one an earnest rocket that follows
course re-entry yet collides, becomes dusk
-ridden, another piece of junk alone.
If I unlid my eyes now to dark space,
rotate myself to your body in sleep,
will my touch make you know me this evening?

The creamy hand you stroked an evening
summers ago still outlines and follows
your lips oscillating in breath and sleep—
I mean, people say they re-dream, that dusk
lighting in a flashback scene. I feel space,
my fingers’ revisits, moments alone—

so come pick a horse, let’s set out alone
from our backyard desert, the pink evening
sky our guide to Yeager or Shepard’s space.
I am your Barbara Hershey who follows,
each clop a year forward. Forget dusk,
misfired synapses, a need to sleep

alone, your orbit, my body follows.
In space, the evening darkness yields a dusk
every forty minutes, lighting sky’s sleep.

Amy Lerman

< BACK | NEXT >

TABLE OF CONTENTS