Too much espresso
on an empty stomach.
I’d almost forgotten what it’s like;
the jitteriness, the edges of the world exaggerated,
so each lamp-post is a monolith
against the sky.
How wise he was,
that Ethiopian goatherd who, seeing
that the berries of a certain bush
had made his flock
go wild-eyed and nervous,
decided he should try them.
He understood that sometimes, people need
to be uneasy in their skulls,
to whet their senses until
they can almost see
all Plato’s demons in the walls.