When Night Fails

Already in various
Nooks of the electric world,
Maximum security

Prisons and torture chambers,
Deep mining excavations,
Tunnels too long for photons,

Anywhere windowless, lit
Equally brightly all hours,
But still an aberration,

Night fails. Not in cities, yet.
Bright as they are, you still know
It’s night up there, if you’re not

Entombed in a casino.
There’s still difference to hours
In the kinds of people out,

But it’s a creeping breakdown
That could spread around the world,
Until there’s no sleep for you

Or for anyone at all
That isn’t on a slowly
Collapsing schedule. Night fails.