The lamp is on, but Candace is asleep:
too many clothes to wash, too many sighs.
The light does not decide which shadows keep
her face in weary blankets of disguise.
It draws forgotten energy in waves,
in years that fold themselves on buried years.
The lamplight reads itself the book of days
while Candace dreams of unremitting tears.
At three-oh-one she rolls above the ash
of burned-out sleep and switches off the light.
She lays awake ’til five-fifteen; the crash
of weariness is merciless. The night
completes itself by sighing at the sun;
the darkness of the day has just begun.