Economy

After you've surrendered to pillows 

and I, that second whiskey, 

on the way to bed I trace my fingers 

over a thermostat we dare not turn up.

You have stolen what we call the green thing—

too thick to be a blanket, too soft to be a rug—

turned away, mid-dream. Yet your legs

still reach for my legs, folding them quick 

to your accumulated heat.

               These days

only a word can earn overtime. 

Economy: once a net, now a handful of holes. 

Economy: what a man moves with 

when, even in sleep, he is trying to save

all there is left to save