armistice (for Ne----)

sand on arms of breeze
tonight's devil wind
its whispertaps on the window glass
and in splintered hour
i stir to the sound

hyphens of waking confusion
in sleep's paragraph
shredded by fingers of storm
the night is a crossroads
of what is dream
and what is known
and the countless blind eyes of the unseen walls
black in sidelong vision
bear useless witness

disorientation
goes on and on
i wake from a dream of you
you're not there
i wake
from a dream
of you
you are
not
there
i
wake

and torture is gradually reborn
in impossibility smuggled back
within unlabeled snarling crates
in the backs of creaking wagons
across the borders of the counties of dream

loathing of covenant
sealed in your snowy strength
(i have no strength to be cold
i have only the weakness of hunger)
a ceasefire
drafted in your ice
signed in my half-extinguished ink

night eyes watch
devil winds listen
i confess to both
hatred for the waking world
without you
hatred for the dreaming world
with you
veteran of a fool's crusade
expatriate by armistice from all territories

and you
and you
and you
you
you
when the slivered moon is low in the sky
do you sleep the flawless slumber
of the victor
or do you toss and twist
and wake to the wind
briefly confused
saddened
at an unnamed absence
with the silhouette
of a man who misses you?