I'm too tired

I close my eyes, just for a little bit,
like scraggly blinds falling

I'm too tired

I let the book, suddenly so heavy,
fold itself
over my nose,
smelling Helen Macdonald's
H Is For Hawk

A nocturnal rain speaks calmly
through the fresh air crack
left open in the balcony door

The garden opens its mouths wide
and drinks voluptuously
from the clouds

The ripple at the pond
mixes
with the ripple from the rain,
at the opposite side
from Dylan's fire crying in the sun,
but similarly

Orchids are getting ready
at the roadsides
of Northbothnia

Individual lives
meet individual deaths,
all orderly marked
with dates of demise, small crowds
and a few words

The living are forced to breathe

Their brains go on thinking,
helplessly

Most dead folks become dust and soot

Some choose to rot

I lift the book off my nose,
open my eyelids,
feel a streak of cool night air
from the great outdoors,
and continue reading
about Mabel, the hawk

Nothing behaves very well,
but the rain is reassuring,
lets our bodies rest
beside one another
in The Great Ship Of Dreams
upstairs;
two human bodies out eight billion...

The Universe stares in awe
at itself,
soon through the James Webb telescope

The Cosmos is fighting
to keep its head above unconsciousness

Evolution leaves the last line unwritten: