To Sleep with the Ineffable: Inviting My Sweet Informants

(Information: a non-accidental signal used as an input to a computer or communication system) 

Cheek to pillow I slide my scalp up 
away from my ear the way I lifted the mother of pearl stem on the
silver lid 
that closed and opened to disappear under itself 
and reveal the engraved soup tureen Father 
brought to Mother from New Orleans in 1940 
to grace our sideboard, filigree legs 
daintily holding its weight on the great 
handled tray also on legs where the scalloped silver ladle
lay too big to fit the hole provided in the round 
immensely smooth coming together of cover 
and oval holding the steaming potato soup 
dotted with butter and sprinkled with cheese, parsley, and
paprika, the ultimate savor for Christmas Eve. 

Is that where I learned it, the uncovering of what 
held in the steam and aroma, tantalized the hunger, 
promised sating in its creamy lumpy richness? 
What difference now that tantalized I raise my scalp 
and open up the inverted feasting that the night provides
gentle ladlings from what the day and wakefulness obscure
to fill my waiting head with savor, nourishment 
and answers brewed in councils I can join 
only at a distance but intimate as sleep itself 
that lavishes my dreams and wakings with all I need to know.