Legend

by Courtney LeBlanc

You lie sleeping beside me, arm heavy

across my body, breathing steady.

A Japanese legend says if you can’t

sleep it’s because you’re awake

in someone else’s dream. I wonder

if it’s your dream that holds me

captive, if we’re together,

free and happy in a way we don’t

exist in the waking world. I count

backwards, ease into sleep, and dream

of an endless hallway with dozens

of doors, each an opportunity

but none contain you.

Courtney LeBlanc is the author of the chapbooks All in the Family (Bottlecap Press) and The Violence Within (Flutter Press) and is an MFA candidate at Queens University of Charlotte. Her poetry is published or forthcoming in Public Pool, Rising Phoenix Review, The Legendary, Germ Magazine, Quail Bell Magazine, Brain Mill Press, Haunted Waters Press, and others. She loves nail polish, wine, and tattoos. Read her blog at www.wordperv.com, follow her on twitter: @wordperv, or find her on facebook: www.facebook.com/poetry.CourtneyLeBlanc.

Image by Keirsten Marie, found on Flickr.

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