She’d sing Teddy Bear’s Picnic to me during the 2 am wakings
pretending to fall out of my bed
so I wouldn’t have to be alone in the second story yellow room
with the window I would fall out of every night in my dreams.

I’d fall to hit the floor
more stable than cold January New York air
And I think she’d cry learning of how,
twenty years later,
I grasp onto things tightly so I won’t have to sleep
alone again
drink coffee too late so I won’t have to sleep at all
if no one’s around,
drink so I can fall asleep and not dream

And how awake, but sleepwalking like I did
when I was two, stopping at the top of the stairs
when she wouldn’t come to my bangings on the floor
repeatedly
like falling out of bed ten times within minutes,
sleepwalking,
I grasp hold of things immaterial
emotions of some kind to make me realize that I’m not in a dream
for the only dreams I have,
the only emotions I feel
are fright and fright
from falling
and anything here,
in the deadland
away from dreamland,
is saturnine reclusion –
fright which I try to conquer with
rage and tears and love
a touch on the back of the neck while wondering when I’m going
to hit ground zero

Since the age of two I’ve lived on the ground floor
been attracted by the basement in my house in Memphis
only scared of it since it was the only room in the house that
didn’t have bars on the windows and the bed that the last tenants
had laid there looked like some Frankenstein’s monster would have laid on –
I’ll read Paradise Lost in the comfort of my bed, thank you.

I know now and I knew then that there were no monsters in my closet
that there was no boogeyman hiding under my bed,
breathing frothy saliva festering breaths
waiting for a hand or foot to creep over the edge.
My fear was of standing on that ledge.
My fear was of falling.