Dave Bonta's "Freighted" is only a few words long, yet it holds a whole sleepless night. It begins with "after love," so we know the lovemaking is over and the speaker is lying in the quiet that follows. Instead of the calm we might expect, the next image is "the night river," which suggests something dark, moving, and hard to stop.
The title matters here. To be freighted is to be loaded like a cargo ship, and the poem picks up that idea when it speaks of "many things of weight." The poem never says what they are, and that is part of its effect. They could be worries, memories, or feelings that closeness stirs up. Judging by the imagery, the thoughts drift through the speaker's mind like barges on the water.
The mood is hushed, reflective, and a little uneasy. Tenderness and heaviness share the same bed, and the speaker stays awake with both.