Pilot Light
by Joseph Kidney
When I was little and collecting words had little
to do with using them I used
to confuse amnesia with insomnia
one being memory loss
the other the memory of loss
that burns in the mind like a pilot light
threatening its flagrant generosity.
Tonight I can no more sleep
than not think of an elephant
when someone says don’t think of an elephant
so I sit reading on your kitchen floor
while a cat in the alley below
twists the wire of its voice into a corkscrew.
Someone in the book says that a child
who seems at ease with our protagonist
knows her like the birds know the morning.
Standing at the window I watch myself
disappear into the general amnesty of sunrise.
Around 6am I crawl into bed
and you put your arms around me
and mumble could I turn out the light
and I say honey that’s the dawn.