In My Sleep

My heart beats well-guarded secrets
The blood in my legs like cooling-off steel
my head like a screened-in pen
feathers of sea gulls fly
I am one with all who take to the sea
from the mouth of the mississippi river tonight

along the brawling noisy New Orleans docks
amid the bustle and competition
sounds of warm-cool jazz, the smell of fish in the air
clattering dice rolling across the deck of the ship
a few miles from the harbor where cargo ships
and their rolling-stone crews sail from port to port
spiked fingers of wrought iron fences closing in
on rusted statues heplessly stuck to the ground
next to park benches where the homeless sleep

I have no home not even a bench
all that I touch falls apart
like petrified rose petal ashes
broken promises made in good faith
a man face crusted by salt and sea
I am those floating scraps
the wind randomly blows away

the day mist rises the night fog sinks
an echo of a small bell stealing away
through the frowning crest-fallen night
leaving the stars overhead nothing behind
from the mouth of the mississippi river tonight
I am one with all who take to the sea