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Restless Night, a poem by Ed Alley

Restless Night

drags to a close.
At dawn, the hospital is waking.
with equipment clatter , 
hallway chatter, 
meal cart’s squeaky wheel,
breakfast on a tray-table,  
meds being fed, 
doctors rounding patients,
bed rumpled, alarms 
if I get up, staff rollover 
at 7.

I sit up, note 
where I am, wish I were home.

I  look out the window  
as molten gold explodes
on the horizon, fills 
the seams in the landscape, blankets
the hospital, sucks 
all the air, overflows
all boundaries, slops 
over the edges,  

spangles 
the earth.

– by Ed Alley


From Ed Alley: "I woke up in the hospital after treatment for pneumonia. This poem resulted. I've always been fascinated by words, what is said, what is meant, what is left out. Poetry challenges me to go deeper into words, to make them come alive."