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83 Sleep in that twilight before sleep, the in-between wash of mute light, the television already a dream fragment of colour against a pastiche of winter field browns like old photographs (memories come easy in this place), the body slowly crumbles, everything seeps from the bones, all day, tensely waiting for the sweat of sugarlessness, the heart’s racing, before the calming of hastily gobbled mints, bonbons, chocolates, anything. i try to suck, but the sugar is too slow so i chew, crushing the stones of energy into the fevered hunger of my blood, waiting for the fix, waiting for the fix. the sweet balm calms the riot, calms the blood. in that lapse there is a metaphor of a twilight place of falling back, no net to catch, just sinking. i live for these small orgiastic pleasures. 84 at midnight, i wake startled by the kick of my nervy legs. the lamplight seems too yellow. i listen for the intruder. He does not come. in this interim, i stare at the seconds switching in spastic efficiency on the clock radio; i long for better days, younger days of nights devoured by sleep. Waking is the nightmare, now. i move slowly to the turn-table. Mahalia’s voice scratches to live buoyed by a wash of organs; they wail, she wails, they drone she drones. i stare into the sound my eyes stoned into a dumb silence. in this equinoctial quiet, i rest. ...

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