"The worst thing in the world is to try to sleep and not to." ~F. Scott Fitzgerald

We started with Billy Collins' "Insomnia". We've taken to reading passages lately, Billy Collins, Anne Lamott, writers we enjoy. We listen for language. Humor. Rhythm. They are students, after all. Eager to write.

A couple of weeks ago, I had to miss one Thursday night.

"We wrote without you," they announced when I arrived the following week, their faces glowing with pride. "Do you want to hear what we wrote?"

And then I knew.

In the beginning I sat alone in Classroom 2. I scoured the halls. Cajoled. Begged. Would anyone come and join me?

It was new. Strange. Unfamiliar.

It started with one brave soul. A Vietnam Vet who knew that writing was what he needed to begin to move the PTSD that had locked him up for so many years.

Just one. Until there was another. And another. And another.

"You know," Betsy said as we were getting ready to write the other day, "We all eat together in the dining hall now. We sit and talk. We're there for each other. People I never thought I'd talk to. Interesting people. Fascinating people. People who are different than me. Very different. We hang out together. You did that. This writing group did that."

"You did that," I said back to them. "Together, you have done that for each other."

Insomnia

"Lying in my bed at night
I can hear the bugs walking on grass
Or someone’s feet
On gravel across the street.

Cars pass by, how fast or how slow
Big engine, little engine.
The water is dripping
Outside from the garden hose.

A voice calls out at another down the street
Never getting up to see.
It will happen again
Tomorrow night like every night.

A small noise wakes me up.
Walking down the hall, the shush, shush, shush
Toilets flushing, doors slamming
A person up for a smoke.

Someone’s music playing in the distance."
- V.

Insomnia

"Tick tock, tick, tock
The noise penetrates deeper, deeper inside my head
Eating away, little by little
Louder and louder until I feel like I am going crazy.

Throwing the covers off I pull out the batteries
and bury the monster
Under a pile of sweatshirts
Lain dormant for months.

I am the only one awake in the whole world.

Flip flop
Like a fish on the deck of a boat.
One side and then the other and back again.
Thoughts race up and down, in and out
Replaying a movie while hoping for a different ending.

I am the only one awake in the whole world.

Alone in a maze of frustration
There is no escape and anger sets in.
I wonder-Why?
But there is no one to ask.
Only silence.

I am the only one awake in the whole world.

Don’t look at the clock
As if looking at the big white numbers will make it real
I don’t and then I do
1:00 and then 2
Counting backwards and asking questions
What time did I go to bed and how long will this go on?

I am the only person awake in the whole world." - S.

The poetry/writing in this post is the work of the members of the New Beginnings Writers, a program of Homeward Bound, a nonprofit organization dedicated to ending homelessness in Marin County, CA. To learn more about Homeward Bound, click here.