Claire Wahmanholm

“Nocturne"

Night and nightshade, yes, but also
               the night-blooming cereus, itself
a cloak of nameless fragrance,
               its face an hours-long brightness
in the desert, crumpling under morning’s
               fist—yes, the night-bloomers
and also the nightingale, night-
               song, night-dew, the nightside
of the heart as if it were a moon,
               the privacy, how lush,
how much its hushedness is a cloak
               against the wind of terror, which drives
the names of all our favorite things
               to the edge of the cliff—so yes,
the asylum of namelessness exists, and also
               rest, and the turning from rest
into nothingness, the kind you’d never know
               was happening, the eye of which
you have always been slowly spinning within.”
― Claire Wahmanholm