Entreating the Darkness
by Odin Roark

What

of this umbrella called night,
this cloak of mystery
so right in its wrong,
a masquerade in demonic joy for some,
a foretelling of sadness for others,
this inevitable conundrum
tossing and turning our questions?

Why

are such distortions of color observed
in the depths of our dreaming,
this refraction of mammalian mirrors
so menacing below the shimmering cobalt
of what is our nocturnal shroud?

How

does so such kaleidoscopic disturbance
invade the protection of our nightly cocoon,
where enclosed in such cosmic embrace
our breathing of nocturne’s healing
is supposed to remove wounds,
vanish one’s scars?

When

might time’s magical moon,
slow-dancing across the sky,
direct a timely beam of simple-hued clarity
upon tomorrow’s sunlit mystification?

Such is

the entreatment of slumber’s lessons,
where answers patiently await the moment
when the student is ready.