The Insomniac Is Alive
there is yet no pillow designed for him
to make him sleep soundly
instantly like a click of flourescent light
or the blink
the flash of hypnotism
or the tap of his hand
then sleep like a dead dog, this insomniac, like you
(it is 2: 09 a.m. now, and what blinks it only this power
of the computer and it buzzing sound like
an insomniac
bee in a sleepless garden)
sleep is too cruel and unkind
not even trying to hold my collar and pull me to a soft bed
and give me peace and rest
well then
go, go away sleepy butterflies go away to
the place of waking flowers and be distant, distinct and
disappear, there is no logic in this manner
on a restless brain of the insomniac
sleepless again but taking most of the time
he writes letters to friends, emails to peers, ecards to nephews
and nieces, articles for journals, pause and think, and press the keys
of the computer again,
a rat passes by so afraid, a cockroach flies on my ear,
a dragonfly is lost again flying like a chopper on the ceiling
a lizard waits and lets loose its tongue to engulf an early breakfast
a cold wind, a soul touches my head, my hair moves like a river
my fingers tic tac toe, my mind on an abra ca dabra, opening caves
where treasures lie
and you follow me on this lonely trek in the night in the coming
of morning, looking for meanings in this literary locomotion
stop there, because in truth, an insomniac who is still alive
has nothing to offer
except that you, must tell some other stories, in this mutual state,
your eyes awake, your nerves wrecked, your minds still rambling
i am through
it is now your turn to speak how fast the clock ticks
how time runs without our knowing
it is now 2: 20 a.m. in the place of my sleeplessness
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Related quotes
Insomniac
Insomniac sit
With your head on your pillow
And think of the girl who
Lies 'neath the willow
The girl is much more
Much more than she seems
As she longs with a yearning
To reclaim her lost dreams
It's midnight and dark
And she sits there to cry
And hoping and thinking
And planning to die
What good can you do
When you cannot sleep
And you can't ask for help
You can't make a peep
So insomniac lay in
Your cold empty bed
Close your eyes
And lie with the dead
Insomniac rest with
Your corpse in the ground
Your soul is at peace
It won't make a sound
And the willow will stand
In the cold blustery night
Fighting the battles
That you cannot fight
poem by Anonymous Ghurl
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In My Own Little World
i sleep.
i need sleep.
the more i need sleep
demand to sleep
lousy thoughts
insomniac maniac
sleep goddess
cruel
she has removed
the covering of my eye
even in sleep
i am awake.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Insomniac Butterflies...
i can't sleep
upon this
Durban Deep,
my eyes are
butterflies
flying out the
window
from the house
of my heart
i am blind
outside the flowers
are captivating
two insomniac
butterflies
winking, the petals
signify
ultimately the breaking
of four wings
i am blinded by the
absence of
my portions
be the flower of my trust
seduce my butterflies
take them
in the sweetness of
your nectar
their proboscis
upon your bosom
in drunken ecstasy
it is only through this
that i will see
the light of morning again.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Sleepless On My Pillow
I'm sleepless on my pillow
just thinking of you,
remembering just what it's like to sleep
the whole night through.
I'm not too bad in daytime
when you're not here.
But when the nights come
and you're not here
I think of you and wonder
how I'll fall asleep?
Don't want to turn the light out
for I know I'll just be
Sleepless on my pillow
just thinking of you,
remembering what it's like to sleep
the whole night through.
I wonder if you're awake
just like me?
Or are you peaceful,
sleeping silently?
When you come home again
I sleep through the night,
never waking up until
the morning light.
But when you have to leave me
for a little while,
it's then I hate those nights again
for I know that I'll be
Sleepless on my pillow
thinking just of you,
remembering what it's like to sleep
the whole night through.
poem by Edwina Reizer
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Sleepless Song
The night approaches
And with it the sleep
That only fitfully comes -
Rest rides reckless
'Til stilled
By the rising sun -
When morning calls
Rise to see
Another all new day -
The insomniac replies
'Tis my only desire,
To sleep it all away -
poem by Smoky Hoss
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The Three Lonely Faces
the rain
in trickles has arrived
at the right time
jibing with the three
lonely faces of women
arriving
in one car from a
distant city
in a few minutes
the entertainment shall
begin
breakfast is served
at the back of the house
just behind
the dirty kitchen
where a native
chicken is
roasted
i am sleepy
with my dirty clothes
on
my pants smell like
a dead rat
i am the usual
insomniac
coping up with
early morning's demands
and these
visitors too
i must
cater
and these lonely ladies
noticing my discomfort
or inconvenience
this tipsy posture
i think
do not mind at all
for they know me
and i know them well too
for quite
a long, long time
tonight
we will drink hard liquor
and talk about
the miseries of other
people
& then
we will be merry
we will be happier together
as we start
all over again
backbiting the moon
quite far
from where we are
falling
drunk, wishing
for something much worse
than death....
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Problematic Sleeping
a sleepless night.
awake, I can't fight.
every thought bounces into my head.
so I let them run
and every single one
rush around and give me pain instead.
.
give my bedroom
one last sweep
so everything looks like it's in place
get into bed
but don't feel dead
as I turn off the light at 12: 23
turn here, leg there,
til I'm tangled as best as can be
hand there, hair's too near
kinda warm- should I ditch the shirt?
uncomfortable, I am.
think about turning on the fan
so real quick-like I do
and the next thing I knew
was that my mind refused to sleep.
poem by D.M.L. Catseye
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Walking Dead
I don’t sleep too well anymore.
I’m usually awake in the morning by 4: 00
I look at the clock and say “Oh no! ”
Should I stay in bed and lie awake
or start my day early with a coffee break?
I’m ready for a nap in the morning by 10: 00.
But then I’d have to start my day all over again.
I’m not a good napper. I hear every sound.
I’m like a ball of string that’s tightly wound
but coming loose at the end.
Now REM sleep, what’s that about?
That’s something I think I’ve done without
for too darn long. It’s a female woe.
A man hits the pillow and off he’ll go.
He’s asleep before you can say goodnight.
It’s obvious it gets worse the older I get.
There’s a clock in my head that must be set
with an alarm that goes off at 4: 00 in the morn.
I wish I could sleep like when I was born.
But that’s not gonna happen soon.
So here I am deprived of sleep.
I’ve tried everything, even counting sheep
but the darn fleecy things keep on comin’
and in my head I hear a drummin’
sayin, ” get up, get up, and get out of bed.
Most times I feel like the walking dead.
poem by Edwina Reizer
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Everything In Poetry Is Allowed
everything in poetry is allowed
so much sweat had been wasted
so many words alienated from their own meanings
on the issue of which is true poetry
enough of that
let me state once more that everything in poetry is allowed
whatever is it that comes from your mouth
that slips from your lips
becomes a poem by the intensity of your intention
today my mouth gives birth to bees
and i am telling you a poem is a swarm of bees
like a set of hands spreading some prayers
tonight i shall dream of words escaping from my mouth
i see them as snakes singing
oh, i see, i am telling you a poem is a choir of snakes hissing a song
(do you really imagine that? am i not a little bit
weird?)
i never tire giving birth to words, and images, and metaphors
and a poem never gets weary like the insomniac still not wanting to sleep
oh, i see, you too must have words like these
those that never sleep, you see? what a poem can be?
a poem is a set of sleepless words, smoking at night, looking over the window,
naked, like a very beautiful woman, looking for love.
you want things to make connections? hmm, don't be silly, some connections
do not seem to be
takes time, sometimes, takes even death upon one's self, to see the light.
but don't you worry, whatever is it, becomes a poem by the intensity of your
affections.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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We Have Not Met Yet
as you read my poems
you imagine what my face would be
given said facts and thoughts like
the way i spend my nights writing
and facing the computer till twilight,
i must be thin, and since i have
lesser sleep, i must have dark
deep, sunken, almond eyes
like the insomniac's night,
my lips may have cracked
due to many coffee cups
giving liveliness to my lines,
my shoulders may have fallen,
due to extreme exhaustion,
my skin may have dried and
my hair may have been scattered
by the strong wind
like those poets who no longer
care for their health and hygiene.
i am sorry but you are wrong.
You have to see me to know me.
You have to touch my hand and
feel the warmth of my palms.
You have to touch my hair to
feel the softness of my soul.
i will that poet who orders plain
mineral water instead of beer.
I may wear a black coat but
there will be no white carnations
inside the pocket of my chest.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Sleepless Eyes Make Sleepless Night
Sleepless eyes make sleepess night
Please world
Give me something to hold on tight,
For even though I have
Sleepless eyes that make sleepess night
I yearn to rest, a rest so peaceful
Only death can make it right.
Sleepless eyes make sleepless night
Please world
Restore my life so it can be in my sight
For all I see is death
Because only death can make it right.
Sleepless eyes that make sleepless night
Rest assues that the world
Will give in and not put up a fight
Otherwise there is but death
Only death can make it right.
Sleepless eyes make sleepless night
Please world
Shine hope back into my life with light
So brightand warm it makes
Death seem not so right.
Sleepless eyes that make sleepness night
Give me the strength and will
That the world will share its might
To fight against death
For only death can make it right.
Sleepless eyes make sleepless night
Please close your eyes
So death will disappear with the sunlight
And let the world
Be the only one to make right.
poem by Music Galore
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Insomnia! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
Destroyed the physical
Evidence of our love;
What to do with
Ones etched in memory?
Like an insomniac
Who lies wide awake
In bed,
I too dread the
Night…
Wish could delete
At the click of a key.
poem by Mamta Agarwal
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Sleepless Night
Oh, there's a rude little lady
Livin' next to me.
Oh, she sure loves someone,
But it ain't me.
Ev'ry night at twelve o'clock,
They start to rock with all they got.
They keep it up all night.
It just ain't right.
They O.K. by me, I'm not.
He and she, they all right.
Once they start, they never stop
Through this sleepless night.
Once I was her lover.
It was so good to be.
Now she's got somebody else and I can't sleep.
Ooh, nothin' hurts people more than other people do.
But what can you do?
Meanwhile, upstairs, they O.K.
Ev'rythin' is all right.
I wish that I could find a way
Through this sleepless night.
Ooh, this sleepless night.
Ooh, this sleepless night.
Ooh, that wicked lady,
She's got a hold on me.
Ooh, she doesn't want me,
But she won't let me be.
They play that music ev'ry night.
It rocks my bed; it shakes my light.
They ball with all their might.
It just ain't right.
Ooh, this sleepless night.
Ooh, this sleepless night.
song performed by by Kinks
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Insomniac Who Drew The Head Of A Sheep Wildly On A White Paper
the insomniac's heart is bleeding. she is in pain tonight like the other past night.
she thinks she is dying right on her own bed. changing positions. finding the right way to sleep. she could not find it. she is lost in the darkness of this loneliness. she goes naked towards the refrigerator to get a cold glass of water.
ice cubes. water rushing to the glass. clicking sound of glass and another glass.
coldness rushing to her esophagus. Coldness multiplying in her burning heart. her blankets burning. She could not sleep tonight. She gets a white paper, a pen and begings to scribble her life: wildly, some lines run. Shaping the head of a sheep. one. two. three. four. five. Five eyes. She stops. She needs five eyes to see everything. Awake. The ceiling where the lizards grow to become alligators on the plywood swamp. No grasses but cobwebs of sleepy spiders.
Five Jacks are hidden on the ears. On the ears are hairs of corn. Blonde. On the nose are paper clips. With them, she is cruel. Then she hides a bull inside her pharynx, the one that shits inside her mouth. She stinks. The bull makes a call for desire. For lust. She closes it with the prison wall of her teeth and gums and lips. Her lips are sealed now. All the five eyes are open throughout the night. Looking for love. Love is not found. Her heart bleeds. Stains of blood penetrate the white paper.
She had not slept for five nights. She will add another five eyes. She knows
if this happens again and again, she will die. She pretends that she is strong.
She will not forget these nights. Preludes to her death. She writes some hieroglyphics all over the empty spaces of the white paper. She will not forget
what each line and curve and sharp edges mean. She codes them. She writes the date 9.2.2008.
She does not put her name. It is enough that no one knows and remembers.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Shadowland (Love Poem)
Trees whisper with a lazy-leafed murmur,
Starlight strange in this shadow-land stark,
At night window-watching, wanting, wishing,
Empty black winding road, without you.
Wind moans soft and branches knock,
Ceiling alive with my shadow nightmare,
An acre of bed, listless, lonely, longing,
Soft white sheets unruffled, without you.
Rain rattles like a rasping smoker’s cough,
Spot-lit droplets make snail shadowed walls
Staring solo awake, alone, alert, alas,
Boredom-struck insomniac, without you.
poem by Ian Beckett
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How Do You Sleep At Night
(jim mcbride/jerry salley)
I havent had a good nights sleep
In weeks now thanks to you
The ghost of broken promises you made
Haunts every room
A hurtin heart cant get no rest round here
I lie awake and wonder how
Your conscience could be clear
How do you sleep at night
Do you toss and turn till the morning light
Does the darkness help
When you lie down with the truth?
How do you sleep at night?
Are you all alone or do you hold someone tight
Do you see me
When you close your eyes?
How do you sleep at night?
Now your side of the beds as cold
As the lies that I believed
Im at the point when I cant even
Trust you in my dreams
Did the way you left me leave you feelin proud?
Or does the loneliness come callin
When the sun goes down?
How do you sleep at night
Do you toss and turn till the morning light
Does the darkness help
When you lie down with the truth
How do you sleep at night
Are you all alone or do you hold someone tight
Do you see me
When you close your eyes
How do you sleep at night
song performed by by Wade Hayes
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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How Do You Sleep At Night
(jim mcbride/jerry salley)
I havent had a good nights sleep
In weeks now thanks to you
The ghost of broken promises you made
Haunts every room
A hurtin heart cant get no rest round here
I lie awake and wonder how
Your conscience could be clear
How do you sleep at night
Do you toss and turn till the morning light
Does the darkness help
When you lie down with the truth?
How do you sleep at night?
Are you all alone or do you hold someone tight
Do you see me
When you close your eyes?
How do you sleep at night?
Now your side of the beds as cold
As the lies that I believed
Im at the point when I cant even
Trust you in my dreams
Did the way you left me leave you feelin proud?
Or does the loneliness come callin
When the sun goes down?
How do you sleep at night
Do you toss and turn till the morning light
Does the darkness help
When you lie down with the truth
How do you sleep at night
Are you all alone or do you hold someone tight
Do you see me
When you close your eyes
How do you sleep at night
song performed by by Wade Hayes
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Insomnia:A Sextet
On Reading Cioran
Leaf caught in a branch of ice,
I am unsleeping,
heroic,
neither dead, nor dreaming,
awake.
I exist when I
don't sleep,
it makes me feel
you there,
me watched.
You think because you
are not God,
I don't know you.
But I've been here as long as you,
I know the territory:
(it's yours and mine) ,
our marriage is
the first map.
II
The Insomnia of Galaxies
is archipelagos
not knowing where they end,
but swirling by each other endlessly,
sleepless
a sea of one accident succeeding another,
moons circling moons,
breath succeeding breath,
sleep, you, sleep, in stillness rest.
III
Virtual Insomnia
Sleepless,
a picture of Giacometti's
Woman Standing stands on the sill,
next to dead roses and a clock.
On a chair, a book propped-open, wide-awake,
shows a woman Utamaro drew once.
Absent-minded,
she sticks a toothpick
through closed lips.
Outside it snows—
who is "it"?
In another room
the weatherman
thinks he knows what whoever is snowing
is going to do with it.
A series of "it"s
underlines the truth—
he doesn't know who snows either,
but streaks the early morning with a stream of empty sound.
IV
Virtual Sleep
In the air over the lake
the big birds fly, wheeling;
they scissor the light,
pattern over pattern, invisible scribbling,
and later,
dive into the trees
for truth.
poem by Ioanna Carlsen
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The Brown's Man's Nocturnal Anxieties
brown man with thick lips
flat nose and bold eyelashes
your face rests on your right arm
you need sleep
you can't
tomorrow is still filled
with anxiety
the night will be insomniac
your eyes are suspicious always
when the lights are finally turned off.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Summer Nights
Oh, how I hate these hot summer nights,
When a good night's sleep is far from sight.
Lying on my bed, I constantly toss and turn,
While the air around me continuously burns.
My window is slightly ajar to let in some air;
I wonder if I'd be slightly cooler downstairs.
I have rolled down my blanket and my sheet,
But despite doing all this, I still feel the heat.
I watch the clock and the time ticks on by,
But, I just can't sleep, however hard I try.
Feeling restless in the middle of the night,
I climb out of bed and switch on the light.
Feeling so far away from the Land Of Nod,
I sit reading a book and then I play my iPod.
I'm having a bad night, and am not impressed:
I didn't sleep much last night, and need my rest.
As the night draws on, slightly cooler air arrives,
But, by this time, the clock has just struck five.
I hear the little birds singing out at dawn,
And it is only then that I give a big yawn.
My eyelids feel heavy and begin to close,
And, after sleepless hours, I begin to doze.
Finally, I fall asleep: inside my soul feels calm,
But a short time later, I'm woken by the alarm.
By now, my room is flooded by brilliant sunlight;
But I want to stay in bed, with my eyes shut tight.
I feel like I'm almost dead, rather than refreshed;
I certainly don't feel anywhere near my very best.
I don't have much energy: I've no get up and go,
And when I do get up, my movements are slow.
I wish that the temperature at night would dip,
Then I could finally get some much needed kip.
poem by Angela Wybrow
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