Sleeps on the crinkled tin
of the chicken coup roof
of the people next door
or ours if theirs is busy
building another clutch of eggs.
Sleeps on the top backstep too
of a different neighbour’s abode, tucked up
like Moses in the warmth, carried away
until mother’s voice calls him
back from the lap of some Pharaoh’s daughter.
Sleeps during the days
snores at night
like a knight chasing errant armour;
I should know
my bed has been placed next to his.
I sleep during the day sometimes
on the concrete block in the backyard
where the outhouse used to be
before the sewerage finally came banging.
Watch the day drift away
and even now
a thousand outhouse days later
I sometimes find a couch or chair
and drift into the best of sleeps.
When the sun sits princely high
and the world for the moment
pauses not to dream
but a genuine pause as if,
like a shoelace, the day
is undone and then in time
securely retied again.
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