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Annie Stenzel
On my first night at altitude, sleep often eludes me
In a strange bed at tonight’s accommodation, I am safely
positioned for the daily descent into repose, rung by rung
. down the ladder, though the absence of my usual pillow
. bodes ill. Am I prepared for this? Never.
Out there, thinner air, and me with (mild) COPD.
. Out there, mountains, high pine, mountain lions. Bears.
Don’t they say it takes a measurable while to adjust
. for every 1000 feet of elevation gain?
. What is it here? Sea level might be a mile below us.
The tricks by which I essay to relinquish the day’s
. tight grip on me fail, one after another.
. Do I tell myself all is well? I cannot.
Do I follow each breath past my upper lip? Not a chance.
. If I sleep, will I dream? If I dream, what will my night-mind
. summon? A lake. A doom. A dead father.
The question of whether one dreams in color has never
been put aside, even after all these years in Pantone hues.
. Am I getting closer to slumber? In an old black-and-white
. movie, images present themselves, then recede. Scene change,
and now the ladder’s rungs slip through my clumsy
fingers as though they were made of fog, not wood or metal.
. It seems we have called it falling asleep since the 14th Century.
. Meaning fall in the sense of to succumb.
About the writer:
Annie Stenzel (she/her) is a lesbian poet who was born in Illinois, but did not stay put. Her second full-length collection, Don’t misplace the moon, was recently published by Kelsay Books. Her poems have appeared U.S. and U.K. journals including Atlas and Alice, Chestnut Review, Galway Review, Kestrel, Night Heron Barks, On the Seawall, Rust + Moth, Saranac Review, SoFloPoJo, SWWIM, The Lake, and UCity Review. A poetry editor for the online journals Right Hand Pointing and West Trestle Review, she lives on unceded Ohlone land within walking distance of the San Francisco Bay.
Image: A Field of California Poppies by Granville Redmond (1871-1935). Oil on canvas. 20 x 25 inches. (Frame cropped away.) 1911. Public domain.
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