Long, thin needles pierce my skin.
I’m afraid of rolling on the table,
off the table,
puncturing myself like a pin cushion,
whisper-screaming help.
Relax, relax,
a faint rubbing alcohol tang rising.

Acupuncture is the latest
in a long list of cures:
hot bath, dark room, blue-light glasses,
CBD, alcohol, meditation,
a book on chronotypes (I’m a dolphin),
prescribing 8 p.m. sex or masturbation.
My wife agrees once,
just to help. She’s confident
I’ll pull out of this funk.

The door opens—
a ray of light before the globe-like head
of Don Diggs. He’s checking in, he says.
I’m fine, I say,
regretting not mentioning
my fear of rolling off the table.
We are, at least,
getting to know me.
“Holler if you need me,” he says,
closing the door.

Darkness again.
I used to love the dark.
Why would Don Diggs leave me
alone in it?
I repeat his name: Don Diggs, Don Diggs—
a folk hero’s name, better suited
to a ballad than a dim office suite.
His smooth Southern voice
could cure insomnia
or talk you into lumberjacking.

His wife, he’s mentioned,
practices Chinese medicine
in the suite they share—
a modest office building
with bathrooms every other floor.
There’s one just across the hall.
I can hear it flush.

Lately I can’t stay
in one place for long.
I’ve become afraid of stillness.
I can’t read.
I can’t lie down.
I can’t think without dread.
I can play Call of Duty
half an hour each afternoon—
my mind locked on
a different show of horrors.

I have a hoarder’s mentality
when it comes to pain.
I might have to accept
how I’m wired—
wired for relief,
wired for selfishness.
Though once I helped
an old woman with her walker
get home in a snowstorm.
No—I love people.

Even my brother,
who is a case—Lord, he is a case
of the neuroticism I thought I’d sidestepped,
but apparently
has come to claim me
in middle age.
My mother too had insomnia.
Her footsteps rang through the night.
I felt sorry for her. Then I didn’t.
Then I did.

The door opens.
Don asks how I feel.
Then tells me to cover my eyes.
He flicks on the lights.
The needles leave one by one,
soft metallic landings in a dish.
“All right now, I’ll catch you in the lobby.”

The mirror tells me I’ve lost some weight,
along with my grounding.
But am I really different
from who I’ve always been—
just trying not to be?
Philosophy, it seems,
is useless at 3 a.m.

In the suite lobby,
Don shares Ayurvedic philosophy,
mentions a Daoist text,
and suggests herbs.
I buy both—why not?
As he runs my credit card,
the night ahead unfurls.
The whole endeavor of faith
requires faith.
Circular, yes—
but what isn’t at 3 a.m.?
I do love my brother.

Outside it’s snowing,
first snow of the year.
“Look—it’s snowing,”
someone says, pointing toward the lamp,
the flakes radiant in the cone of light.
I watch the cascade
of crisp flakes funneling down—
tiny collisions, fleeting unions.
And I try—
I try to believe
they understood where to find us in the dark.