around me, the snores,
the window tree,
its overgrown slap against glass,
the scamper of tunneling mice,
the quake of the diurnal
in their murmuring beds,
moon’s spider-leg progress
across the wilds of the ceiling –

from such unpromising sounds,
the castle –
out of ordinary scratch and sigh,
a drawbridge floating down –
based on all that shadow proposes,
a delicate troop
of longing, of wisp,
of remembering times ten
crossing a star-lit moat –

the betoken, the pleasurers,
those who transport…
why should I dream what
cough or creak may bring me?

John Grey is an Australian born poet. Recently published in The Lyric, Vallum and the science fiction anthology, “The Kennedy Curse” with work upcoming in Bryant Literary Magazine, Natural Bridge, Southern California Review and the Oyez Review.