A disturbance;
Something stirs you
And you lay,
dazed and dry-mouthed.
Reach for the glass beside you
And knock it over.
It softly thuds onto carpet, but
You hear another noise too.
A knock, or perhaps a distant voice?
You cannot place it. You lay, arm outreached
and grasping at the fallen glass, silent and still,
Listening for the sound again.
You think you hear it. How can you not be sure?
A knock, or maybe some kind of click.
Your cold arm retreats back underneath
As you wait once more
For confirmation of the sound
Nothing,
Nothing,
And then -
You hear it.
Indeterminate, as before, but more real and more audible than nothing.
You cannot hope to sleep now
With the quasi-presence of a half-fear
Lingering in your room; and your mind.
Is that a shirt hung on the door, or a hooded spectre looming?
Is that rap at the window a tree branch, or malicious interloper?
In the dark hours, nothing is certain
And doubt casts a mighty shadow
Over an already shadowed world.