Once Arranged

The phrase startles you—or rather,

You startle yourself with the phrase.

You’ve been a reading a short story,

Getting increasingly dozy

While mountains rise against the sun,

What with the evening coming on,

But does doziness explain this?

One sentence read, An encounter

Between two such specimens should

Not be avoided, but you heard

It in your own voice, in your head,

As, An encounter between two

Such specimens, once arranged, should

Not be avoided. Once arranged,

The phrase you added, felt solid,

Of a piece with the whole sentence,

Which, in turn, felt like you wrote it.

Was this was this just due to sleepiness?

Are you going a little bit mad,

Hallucinating extra text?

This has been happening of late.

You drift off reading, and go on

Composing your own words to read

But as if part of the same text,

In your head, until you startle

Awake. Even now, it feels right,

Your dream version of the sentence,

Once arranged, and the thought slips through,

What if the first draft had said that,

Then the phrase, once arranged, been struck?

What if proximity to death

Lets you read through the palimpsest?