from "The Hideous Hidden" by Sylvia Legris

 1, Plummet

WITNESS THE SPECTACLE OF THE WAKING BODY.
WHEN THE BODY IS AWAKE THE SOUL ACQUIESCES 
TO EYES, TO EARS, TO LOCOMOTION AND TOUCH.

WHEN THE BODY STIRS, THE SOUL FOLLOWS
IN THE BODY'S ORBIT.

                                    ~

WITNESS THE SIGHT OF THE SLEEPING BODY.
WHILE THE BODY IS ASLEEP, THE SOUL, ALL-PERCEIVING,
OVERSEES THE FUNCTIONS OF THE BODY,
THE FUNCTIONS OF THE EYES, OF THE EARS,
OF MOTION AND TOUCH.

WHILE THE BODY DREAMS, THE SOUL SURVEYS
THE SPECTACLE OF THE SKY.

. . . . . . . .
What is the little book
of the collected work of sleep?

What is the sleepless continuo? 
The endless malady?
The restless octave
that inoculates night?

. . . . . . . .
Nocturna suppressio.
The bacterially spreading falsetto.

. . . . . . . .
Dark dialyzes day's deliriums.
(Desperate cases demand desperate doses.)

Diazepamic diatonic.
The chemically sung interval
between sleep and shortfall
(the short slip between

falling hypnagogic
off a cliff and falling
off a cliff). The shudder
awake, the crash.

- from The Hideous Hidden by Silvia Legris, pg. 20 (New Directions, 2016)