Sleep

Sleep.

Just out of reach and teasing me with the possibilities.  It comes creeping up the stairs and peers around the corner with a catch-me-if-you-can look but just as I nearly grab it by the throat, it vanishes like smoke and it's three am.  And I'm awake again.  The cats glance my way then sensibly curl up and close their eyes but the dogs are restless.  Thanking my lucky stars for a fenced yard (my friend Kathryn is routinely forced to leave her bed and walk her dogs through the sleeping neighborhood at this and other ungodly hours), I let them out and stand at the back door waiting.  The summer air is heavy and the darkness thick with random streaks of moonlight weaving through the trees.  It's a somehow sad time and I can almost sense time passing as I wait. The dogs come in, beg for a biscuit, then trot back into the bedroom to resume sleeping, a most reasonable idea to my mind, but not one I get to share.  My personal Mr. Sandman has come and gone this night - the 4th time in the last 6 days - and I'm weary with frustration and tiredness, anxious to find a way around this latest episode of insomnia and go back to dreamland if only for another hour or two.  Being annoyed at not being able to shut off my mind only makes it worse, I know, but as is so often the case, it's out of my control.

Sleep.

I listen to the air conditioner hum steadily, to the small brown dog breathing, to the occasional creaks and moans every old house has, to the whispery rotations of the floor fan in the sun room.  About 4, my next door neighbor leaves for work and I hear the slam of a car door then the start of an engine.  The black dog growls softly, sleepily, but lets it pass.  The little dachshund shifts in his basket, paws briefly at his pillows, sighs.  A train whistle blows from far away, a lonely and muted sound.  A cat screeches briefly outside the window. A siren wails and the little alarm clock on the nightstand ticks relentlessly.  A breeze - or possibly a squirrel, it could be either - stirs the leaves of the crepe myrtle against the windows.  The night and the night noise go on.

Sleep.

By dawn, I can hear traffic noises and birds.  The clouds are tinged with blue - as if filled to capacity with much needed and over due rain - I think what a joy and a relief a downpour would be to this poor, dried up, cracked earth with its brown grass and nearly scorched flower beds.  I think maybe the ground longs for water as I long for sleep.

Maybe tonight.