For the sleepless

by Hana Wilde

Some nights, I think I hear the baby
growing in her sleep,
the creak and rustle of stems.

The world insists on forward motion:
the column of sleet
holds a rainbow within it,
lone passenger up the loch.

She insists
on forward motion. So,
every day, we walk; and with each step
I fight the urge to fall

Into the winter,
the waiting snow;
to crawl into the slow dark peat,
dissolve into the rock below.