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When Sleep Will Not Come

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The coldness behind too much pain.

The 4 am breakdown and the lost chance

of starting all over again.

Breathing is hard, is not what you expected

as a child when thinking of all the good things to come.

Empty screens and love eroded by bad circumstance.

A child, your child you wish you could do better for,

to take the anger from her home and let love be more.

But now there are the months of no-way-out and

so much thin hope to poke a finger through.

But now I want no affection, just an exit zone

where existence and accountability disappear.

There are bugs running up and down the strands of my hair.

My vision is blurred. My hands are like dried clumps of clay,

stiff and far too cold. My sandcastle has arrived, collapsed

and bagged at the foot of my door.

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Copyright © 2000 by Allison Grayhurst

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

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.First published in “Green King Poems and Poetry Zine” November 2015

http://greenkinglit.blogspot.ca/2015/11/when-sleep-will-not-come-poem-by.html

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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

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“Allison Grayhurst intertwines a potent spirituality throughout her work so that each poem is not simply a statement or observation, but a revelation that demands the reader’s personal involvement. Grayhurst’s poetic genius is profound and evident. Her voice is uniquely authentic, undeniable in its dignified vulnerability as it is in its significance,” Kyp Harness, singer/songwriter, author.

“Allison Grayhurst’s poems are like cathedrals witnessing and articulating in unflinching graphic detail the gritty angst and grief of life, while taking it to rare clarity, calm and comfort. Grayhurst’s work is haunting, majestic and cleansing, often leaving one breathless in the wake of its intelligence, hope, faith and love amidst the muck of life. Many of Allison Grayhurst’s poems are simply masterpieces. Grayhurst’s poetry is a lighthouse of intelligent honour… indeed, intelligence rips through her work like white water,” Taylor Jane Green, Registered Spiritual Psychotherapist and author.

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