A little something in case you can’t sleep.

Delicate, Fingerless

I found some 3 a.m. turbulence in pitch black sleeping
beside the railroad tracks off Wilson Road.  Is it yours? 
I followed it through the alleyway down Dead House Row, 
then it stopped and stood still. I tapped it on the shoulder 
and it turned. Its face: a drawing of someone standing in a window. 
It made a grand sound. A low moan. No skin and all gloom.

It became a hungry woman with hissing hair and scales for scalp. 
Does it need medication? Do you miss it entirely, 
like a cut-down breast misses her blood engine? 
It wants to remember you. I talk to it. Offer names 
that might bring comfort. When I say William, 
it licks its lips. When I sing Mary, Mary it sways and sways.
When I ask where it came from, it mouths that empty girl.

-Rachel McKibbens

And if you think you’ll be up for a while, she puts some pretty sensational writing prompts up on her blog.