Brunette Poem by John Courtney

When the wild-beating heart wakes me
and I gasp for air in the middle of the night
having visited a dead friend, I lie there
sometimes for twenty or thirty minutes feeling
the cold touch of a raven's lips blowing hair
gently across my face. I come into the still presence
of light from a buzzing lamp post and think
about the weakness of the freshly-dead stars,
I take a swig of something wet and turn it
around at the corners of my mouth. I swallow and
lie back down in a similar body pulling the
curtains on my eyes, I lie there for another
twenty or thirty minutes and wonder where
the raven went, apologizing to the stars,
my friends who patiently wait to feed again.