Sleep Cycle

This poem stemmed from a prompt for Writers Island. The theme this week was renewal. I struggled with it a little bit, at first, but happened upon this image at the last moment.

Sleep Cycle

My body is a miracle, when it works.
Each night, it renews itself, replaces
dull skin with fresh, recycles

old blood with new. All while I sleep,
legs pressed to my chest, arm slung
over my eyes, shielding my face

as if from attack. Mouth slack
and snoring. My unconscious mind
discards old thoughts, shuffles memories:

my grandmother is still alive, six years
after her death, cooking me eggs.
My boss from two jobs ago hires me back,

asks me why I’m so late. I want to scream
that it’s Sunday, but my jaw is glued shut. My mind
rewinds and recoils and I call these dreams.

I ponder their significance, wonder why
I remembered this person, after so many years. I never
really notice all of this, until it stops working,

until I spend one night singing the same
old Indigo Girls song to myself, in one unbroken
verse, or I watch my cat chase the same

phantom moth in the corner. After nights like these,
I spend my days shaky and awake, crushed
inside my rumpled clothes. I stare too long

at my computer screen with caffeine jittery eyes,
replay memories of fourth grade heartbreaks and yesterday’s
mistakes, my heart pumping last night’s tired blood.