The Dream of Nothing

Sherod Santos

All morning snow has heaped up against the two
Small lawn-level windows like the slow compulsion
To dream of nothing outside ourselves, the dream
Of zero which darkens those moments between sleep
And waking: not like forgetting, or even less
Some spent emotion, but so much more like a day
In September when the steam of summer rises
Off the wet roads in Tennessee, when the one
You love may no longer feel the need to say
Almost anything anymore . . . And in that moment
The mind gives in to an absence that's become
A kind of longing all its own, a desire
For something we can't quite touch, and never can
Conceal-as in these hours spent sitting
In the study, as in these words, made less
Of us than of winter and snow and nothingness.