Sleep

All Poems, Hope, Panic, Sleep, Stories, Worry

Worries Pummel Me

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Worries pummel me all night like rain.

Unremitting tempest.

Body tossing.

This way, that, side to side.

In choppy waters.

Holding tight the rail.

With each dip, another thought.

What’s going on with a granddaughter?

Ferried to Montefiore Hospital for labs?

What’s happening in my mouth?

Pain tormenting me?

Will I get to the dental appointment at seven?

What are those aches in my body?

Knee, hip, shoulder.

Out of alignment from a fall.

On a city curb.

Unexpected, disorienting.

Then, the litany of intrusive flashes.

Unrecognizable silhouettes in a fog.

Names, faces of long lost cousins.

People I forgot to text.

Unanswerable questions.

Would I ever get back to Buenos Aires?

Does this or that person remember who I am?

So, it went.

Shifting, turning.

Shutting, opening eyes.

Waiting for dawn.

Release from pelting assault.

Too bad windows shuttered.

Keeping out last night’s storm.

For it’s song I long to hear.

Carolina wrens and catbirds.

Flapping from tree to tree.

Lullabies soothe my soul.

Restore my energy.

 

Lynn Benjamin

May 30, 2024

Aging, All Poems, Family, Mother Love, Parents, Sleep, Spain, Trips and Places

Improbable Floats in Dreams

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The improbable floats in dreams.

While in Valencia, asleep.

My mother comes.

Driving a white Olds station wagon.

Dropping me off for a childbirth class.

Still parked when I race out to hand her a mat.

I couldn’t haul around all day.

Relieved, I think how reliable she is.

There to pick up the pieces.

When my eyes open.

To see my face in the mirror.

Lines, puffy skin, swollen lids.

Exactly my mother in old age.

Why had she come to me?

Was it the pile of postcards on the table?

Like the ones I wrote to her?

Daily, when traveling.

The scarves I saw in shop windows?

Jewelry?

LLadró?

The gifts I carried home to her.

All those reminders of journeys.

Thoughts of my mother far away.

Wanting to please, to comfort her

like she did for me, each day.

 

Lynn Benjamin

January 15, 2024

 

 

All Poems, Christmas, Holidays, Natural Beauty, Plants, Sleep, Time, Trips and Places, Valencia

January 6th in Valencia

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It’s quiet on January 6th.

Before sunrise.

A few walkers march along.

As I head to a nearby park.

Thinking of children awakening.

Finding gifts in their shoes.

From munificent Magi.

Moon trades places with sun.

In a gentle accord.

While I observe the scene.

Yellow cosmos, African lilies.

Cyclamens, red and white.

Huge Moreton Bay Figs.

Swaying palm trees.

Street sweepers.

Clearing remnants of last evening’s parade.

Pigeons stirring.

Filling the square with songs.

Pecking for discarded crumbs.

When a random thought pops in my head.

As I wander paths

under lightening skies,

my family back at home

has yet to wake and rise.

 

Lynn Benjamin

January 11, 2024

 

 

All Poems, Family, Grandchildren, Humor, Sleep

Asher Insisted

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Asher insisted he needed a room with a window.

The only way I’ll wake up, he said.

Eschewing his usual place in the basement.

Built without windows.

To accommodate babies’ naps.

But lately used by Asher.

One college semester now under his belt.

Declaring a new strategy.

A space upstairs with his brother, Elias.

Who bounces out of bed at seven thirty.

Dressed, ready for the day.

The new plan prevailed.

At ten, I marched upstairs.

Opened bedroom blinds.

Letting in sun’s rays.

Still, Asher didn’t stir.

Despite the noise of serving breakfast.

Aromas of eggs, toast.

Clatter of washing dishes.

Seconds, minutes, hours sashayed by.

Still, no Asher.

So much for morning light

cascading bright into the room.

If a young man roams at night,

morning’s swallowed by afternoon.

 

Lynn Benjamin

December 25, 2023

 

 

 

All Poems, Sleep, Time

Time Fell Back

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Time fell back with a thud.

A full hour this past weekend.

Changing the balance of light and dark.

Night arriving at five thirty.

Daylight at six.

Jarring the body.

Jolting the mind.

Jouncing circadian rhythms.

At dinner table, yawning.

Yearning for bed.

Eliminating evening productivity.

Jumping up earlier in the morning.

To sunlight dancing at the window.

Illuminating the room.

Squirrels scratching walls.

I know this ritual well.

Twice annual adjustment for who knows what?

Changing time zones sans suitcase.

Heading nowhere exciting, new.

Disrupting dreams, feet in place.

 

Lynn Benjamin

November 10, 2023

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All Poems, Change, Family, Humor, Sleep, Spouses

Pillow

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Your pillow’s arriving in an hour, announced Bob.

Getting ready to leave for Manhattan.

To pick up grandchildren.

Maybe I’ll take a nap, I quipped.

Knowing I’d be baking bread, a pie.

Pulling a Shabbat meal together.

Why, you might wonder, did I order a pillow?

For, after many years of marriage, I have dozens.

Let me explain.

Never ever did I own one made of down.

Always synthetic stuffing.

For my husband had terrible allergies.

But, he went for weekly treatments.

Till his reaction to plumage, gone.

As evidenced in Cape May.

When both of us slept on feathers.

Fell into deep, relaxing slumbers.

Without sneezing, wheezing.

But rather than tempt fate,

I ordered only one for me.

Hoping no repercussions.

No need for apology.

 

Lynn Benjamin

October 8, 2023

All Poems, Maine, Sleep, Trips and Places

The House by the Dam in Bristol

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Airport delays.

Losing luggage.

Stop, shop in Freeport.

Eat dinner into darkness at Shuck Station.

Drive over the bridge.

By the dam.

Find the house.

Built in 1838.

Almost two hundred years old.

Full of strange noises.

Wooden plank floors.

Staircases.

Plump mosquitos.

Spiders, moths.

Who knows what’s outside?

In the pitch of night.

Best to make beds, bathe, lie down.

Postpone exploring till morn.

When light streams in like goldenrod.

Eyes open wide, reborn.

 

Lynn Benjamin

August 8, 2023

 

Adult Children, All Poems, Cousins, Family, Grandchildren, Grandparents, Siblings, Sleep

How to Make Room

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At the table, my son and his wife ponder.

How can we make room for additional guests?

Two siblings and a few more children?

So they can see each other?

So the cousins can recognize kin?

So they can frolic?

For my son and his family had traveled far.

From Los Angeles to Montreal.

Then by car to Vermont.

Finally, Burlington to Philadelphia.

To our three-bedroom condo.

With an extra room in the basement.

All spaces already filled.

Grandchildren on all levels.

Including on the floor of the master bedroom.

How to fit yet more?

Put another mattress on the basement floor?

Consolidate the infant with his parents?

Thus, freeing a bed?

Who was willing to sacrifice comfort?

For connection?

Though the outcome isn’t clear,

siblings work on what to do.

Calculate possibilities.

Beds and mattresses review.

As they think on it and brainstorm,

my mind somersaults in play.

Remembering George Herbert:

Where there’s a will, there’s a way!

 

Lynn Benjamin

April 19, 2023

 

 

 

 

All Poems, Family, Humor, Sleep, Spouses, Stories

Weighted Blanket

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Out of the blue, Bob declared he’d try a weighted blanket.

Why?

To help with bouts of insomnia.

He’d been treating with midnight sips of sherry.

Sometimes, half an Ambien.

But, here was a solution free of chemicals.

Something ordinary.

Easy to order on Amazon.

For arrival the next day.

He’d read about weighted blankets.

Knew Temple Grandin studied them.

To soothe autistic children.

With a giant hug.

A sensation that gained popularity through the years.

To help anyone with anxiety, depression, trauma.

Till it was marketed to relax everyone.

Children, babies, adults.

To calm the nervous system.

Facilitate sleep.

In short, Bob placed his order.

A fifteen-pound single blanket, weighted with beads.

With which he cloaked himself at night.

Exclaimed its virtues the next morning.

Deep sleep.

Colorful dreams.

Reduced hip pain.

On it went.

Until one morning.

He awoke.

As usual, extolling the magic.

Detailing the REM sleep.

Till noticing the blanket wasn’t on him at all.

Rather, it laid in a heap on the floor.

Beside the bed.

It was a sight that gave him pause

to question the miracle cure.

Was it a gimmick, a talisman?

Dumbo’s feather to reassure?

Hard to know, he laughed out loud.

But, stayed faithful though not full sure.

As long as he dreamed, he was content.

Felt more confident, more secure.

 

Lynn Benjamin

December 31, 2022

 

Aging, All Poems, Birth, Change, Death, Environment/Mother Earth, Loss, Love, Natural Beauty, Sleep

When Do You Pause?

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When do you pause to ponder life’s end?
In a pandemic when so many, plucked too soon?
When loved ones pass?
While reading obituaries?
On Yom Kippur, Judgement Day?
When Spring bursts white, pink, lavender, yellow
in April splendor?
Seductive aromas,
lures for bees and me,
recitals galore, free.
Cardinals, finches, robins,
even hummingbirds, woodpeckers
to swell the concert pit.
Or when grandchildren climb upon your knee
to caress your tree bark face
between smooth fingers?
In an instant, you know
with certainty that requires
no scholarly debate,
no religious affirmation,
no actuarial explanation,
that days are short for you
despite lengthening light
and Mother Earth’s annual gestation rituals:
breaking water, spreading sunshine,
birthing warm, green, pristine;
cracking eggs, unraveling cocoons;
yawns of rabbits, squirrels, raccoons;
nature’s palette brushing blooms.

Zap, in the magic of the moment,
in the mystery of genesis
lies concealed the inexorable course of demise.
The ecstasy, sorrow,
lovers intertwined, tangled tight
commingle pain, joy
loss, light.
Perchance protected,
amid arms, senses, musings, beliefs,
acceptance triumphs,
resistance retreats.
Heart calms.
Breath stills.
Eyes flutter.
Sweet relief.

Lynn Benjamin
April 5, 2021