Sinking

And I felt myself falling,

      not through

the mattress, but rather,

off to the other side.

      Yet my mind was

scrambling for an out, even while

my back seeped down

through dark molasses air;

pot of fear burbling in the gullet.

And the bedpost stood so close,

but my arms, straining against

      the glut of night,

wouldn’t move any faster.

A woman 

in Victorian bodice and skirt

stood at the foot of the bed,

      her hands wrapped,

her spectral head 

cocked slightly askew,

eyes so forlorn.

And I fell through black.