From somewhere back, a light keeps flashing:
A billboard asking me to sleep.
Downstairs, my neighbor is bathing.
I hear him humming a polka. I hear him thinking about me:
"What does she do when I can’t hear her marching?"
I’ll never tell him I dream of the army.
I could’ve enlisted, been a sergeant by now.
Downing brown whiskey and cursing civilians.
If I were a soldier, I’d be sleeping by now,
my helmet full of rumble and letters from Mother.
Instead, I am wakeful,
Remembering you in your white,
loose, all-over summer and constantly giggling.