A Glass of Water
I pour a glass of water for myself.
I watch what greys it gathers from the room.
It's not to drink. I want the wanting of
a glass and water sleep can come between.
The glass of water sits there half the year.
Its level drops. Its bubbles bloom and burst.
I get the glass of water's hardly you,
and still I rise to mouthing arid toasts:
to hunger, thirst; to bliss that goes without;
to love abstained, the lull until the flood;
to near enough to touch it hurts, and not;
all windblown wishes, thistles in a field.
I tilt the glass of water to my lips.
I hold like this, before the wanting stops.
Conor O'Callaghan
Live Streaming
The Gallery Press
Copyright © 2017 by Conor O'Callaghan
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission