Silence Outside

Sometimes at night
I wake up in a startled hush
The quiet of the world patting me on the face
Whispering me back to sleep


And yet I quietly refuse the Night's wishes
Like a man to his dying mother.
I push her struggling hands away from me and rise,
Rise out into the night.
And in that brief moment, I
Don't know what I am.

I stand in the shadows of the room and feel ageless.
I look down and see the hands of an infant
yet they (all at once) become gnarled and grainy,
Ageless.

I stand in the middle of the room at night,
and become a part of the quiet dark. Outside
A streetlight colors the fog of the earth.
Silent streets that lead to where ever.

Eventually, I make it back into bed,
simply because there's no where else to go.
The drowned out face of the pillow hits my own,
and I forget just exactly how alone I was.


Only a silence outside remains.