Jim Harrison

Here’s a poem for those of you who experience sleepless nights by American poet, novelist, and essayist Jim Harrison (December 11, 1937 – March 26, 2016).

Mother Night

When you wake at three AM you don't think

of your age or sex and rarely your name

or the plot of your life which has never

broken itself down into logical pieces.

At three AM you have the gift of incomprehension

wherein the galaxies make more sense

than your job or the government. Jesus at the well

with Mary Magdalene is much more vivid

than your car. You can clearly see the bear

climb to heaven on a golden rope in the children's

story no one ever wrote. Your childhood horse

named June still stomps the ground for an apple.

What is morning and what if it doesn't arrive?

One morning Mother dropped an egg and asked

me if God was the same species as we are?

Smear of light at five AM. Sound of Webber's

sheep flock and sandhill cranes across the road,

burble of irrigation ditch beneath my window.

She said, "Only lunatics save newspapers

and magazines," fried me two eggs, then said,

"If you want to understand mortality look at birds."

Blue moon, two full moons this month,

which I conclude are two full moons. In what

direction do the dead fly off the earth?

Rising sun. A thousand blackbirds pronounce day.

--Jim Harrison

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