Local Improvements

Lately I have been tortured by insomnia. Brain buzzing, nauseous, memorizing the ceiling in the middle of the night. Up in a fuzzy gray dawn with shaking hands and I know not to look at the clock, to start down that gut-churning slope of checking, checking. So I lie there, knotted with dread, and when I hear the first call to prayer from the mosque around the corner, I know it is 5.40AM and I am fucked. I will have another day where I struggle for civility, my teeth razors to cut my mouth and anyone else.

Today it is brilliantly sunny and I walk to the train on the bright side of the street. I pass the mosque, and realize I have not heard first call for several days in row. There have been local improvements, for sure.