Asleep Poem by Windsor Guadalupe Jr

She found me – asleep
As they were exhuming my body
That was swathed with vitriol,
And grief, and an unforgiving gesture
As I froze in between two pillars,
Surrounded by people – I go unnoticed,
And beside a lion, I was stern with my quandary
Even sterner with my hope:
That nothing ever assuages.
The truck engine roaring in between
White, fine lines made no sense
Even the couples that enfolded me a moment ago
As the public vehicle rummaged through the freeway,
Seeking answers to the only question:
What assuages?
Nothing ever assuages.
They were wide awake in my somnolence,
In my terrific struggle in effacing nostalgia.
This curdling saudade has left me in a fetal position
Of coiled veins and ruptured arteries –
What elixir lies in between blunted tongues
Of the whispering ruckuses?
I hope to find what the others seem to find –
Until then, asleep
With the ashen walls and cumbersome doors:
I am asleep, and this slumber claims me one by one
From bony prominences, to collar bones of arid folds and
Calcified dreams, up to gossamer lips now chaffed.
Sweat pooling behind me
As the Sun slept in the furlough –
Muted by a corner, only heard by one
That was enough, but still,
Nothing ever assuages.
Forever, asleep.