Beset by the babblings of ten thousand hungry spirits
I lay waking through the night.

Ten thousand tongues of implication, 
insinuation, and regret,
the dispossessed, the undecided
half-wed and set aside,
the invitations and temptations and scolds 
that drift thick 
on every way 
and surface of my life.

Not now, I whisper and hurry on,
day-eyes fixed on finer goals.
Not now, later, later.


Here now 
they've come to collect.