Sleepless Poem by Prabhakar Subramaniam

Sleepless



No grown-up could
Sleep anymore
Those who went
Bravely to bed
Woke up screaming
At what they saw
Said they'd dare not again
Doctors said:
'This is a variant
Of sleeplessness
Which has now
Turned into an epidemic.
More than sleeplessness
It is now a fear of sleep.
However this virus will also die out! '
For those afflicted, it was atrocious
That there could be no
Respite from reality
Some said they saw a ghost*
Of a king with a blood-soaked dagger
Lamenting he had murdered sleep
Those by the sea
Saw a tsunami
Everytime they closed their eyes
The station master
Woke up with a head-on collision
The rich broke
The employee with the pink slip
The student failed in all subjects
The lover with a break-up
The home-owners with foreclosure
The land-owner with squatters
The politician with a frenzied mob
The idolatrous with iconoclasts
Diabetics with low sugar
Models with face scars
Film producers with movie bans
Spendthrifts with huge credit card debt - -
Through it all the children slept
Clinging to whatever was left


*Macbeth

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Angela Michel 01 March 2013

Interesting idea, really well put together. liked 'through it all the children slept' good line!

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