Asleep at the wheel

To tired to lift the head

To see the crash ahead

The enchanting lullaby

 Playing in the background

The collective cannot rise

Their tired eyes

Their job is done

Please take the wheel

The yawning will fall

Lost in a sleepwalk

Summoning a release that will not come

Blissful unconsciousness will not last a mile

-Camille Delaquise

This poem appears in Behind the Facade, Camille’s debut contemporary poetry collection. Asleep at the wheel speaks to the danger of collective exhaustion — a state in which passivity, distraction and depleted agency leave people vulnerable to drifting blindly toward harm.