So much of who I am,
I am while sleeping.
A liberating lawlessness
ascends with the descending dark.
The guardians vacate the premises
leaving me alone in my unconscious skull.
The librarian goes home
and leaves me among books.
The playwright goes home
and leaves me unscripted.
The stage manager goes home
and leaves me with properties.
The censor goes home
and leaves me with no words redacted.
The policeman goes home
and leaves me with no enforced law.
The preacher goes home
and leaves me with no gospel to guide me.
Unleashed,
other lives play out their themes
upon my soft white pillowed stage.
When I wake in the morning light,
every night life leaves and I stumble
onto the stage of the new day,
the guardians waiting to guide me.