The Unmade Bed

Running rest-day ...

... here's a poem by Gerard Woodward, from his (pictured) 1991, second collection ... a very evocative verse:


The Unmade Bed

The unmade bed will stay
Unmade, proof of a night

Of healthy disturbances.
We could not have made

This mess unless we loved.
Only the houses of the dead

Are neat, and lunatics wake
To perfect sheets and ordered pillows.

Ours is a bed of tough
Vivid weeds in which the springs

Have come up like worms
From the dark underworld of shoes.

The pillows have lovebitten us.
We have slept folded in a soft weapon

Packed with triggers ready to shoot us,
Two human bullets, through the ceiling.

Sleeping is a risk, a fight, a chance.
Most of us will die in bed,

That is a fact, that is why
Walking across one can feel like treading

The shaky ground
That has dried over quicksand.

The unmade bed must stay unmade
For the day, until we're tired again;

Then we'll stretch a sheet
Between us. It will tremble like a sail

Catching breath. We'll fold strong corners,
Knowing how much it takes to hold us.