Voyages



Clean sheets scented with sunshine

and newly mown grass

make great white billows

catching the summer wind

like ships' sails ready to glide

around and around the earth



Tonight, in my old iron bed

they will carry me on a voyage

to a distant and enchanted land

where women wrap sheets of silk

around and around their bodies

like colorful butterfly cocoons



Or, to jagged mountains where

ice sheets shimmer in the sun

above valleys so deep that

the shadows appear solid

as gleaming black onyx strips

draped around and around the bases



Then, to the most remote depths

of lonely ocean floors

where tiny yellow fish swim

in waving sheets of gold

their movements patterned

as music going around and around



Tomorrow, the morning sun will

caress my clean sheets

lighting the damp wrinkles

of a dream tossed summer night

while a new day's work sails

around and around in my head