Sleep Hag
 
By now, I've learned what to expect from her, 
the withered face and grey mouth 
stretching open, the pressure that drives 
my chest into the mattress.  Paryalytic throat, 
unable to unknot a scream, limbs locked stiff.  
 
She's visited before.  A hungry witch,
spilled loose from the centuries, 
she's squatted on the chests of peasants 
considering revolt, intended women who meant to dream 
of curtsying before a line of noblemen.  She's lingered 
over scullery maids and flappers, the single man 
left in town after the war began, who welcomed her 
with tears because his body was seamless once again.  
She's belly-crawled through decades, looming
over the weary sock-hopper who watched her take shape 
from a cunnilingus-adept Elvis and she's spent so many nights 
with the conspiracy theorist, he's convinced he understands 
the mystery behind alien abductions and stares defiantly 
into her eyes searching for governmental bar codes.  
 
Now she's here, a crouched shadow behind my bureau.  
In a minute she'll rise and move 
toward me, and the bottom of the bed will dip 
as she crawls up.  I've no choice but to wait and watch, 
well-informed of the doom taking shape near the sock drawer.  
I won't awaken until something in me gives, 
voices its tiny admission that I'm willing to trade this fear 
for death.  A finger will twitch and knead loose the rocks 
that have settled under my skin.  I'll gasp and curl 
into the man who sleeps next to me, resentful
of his dreamless rest.  I'll let his body anchor me 
to this room scraped newly clean, its smell of skin
and unwashed sheets, the ceiling fan that twists
the air and starts once more to stir 
shapes into these dark and doubtful corners.