It’s that time of day,
that time of year when
all you fear comes to life.
It’s that time of night,
that time of anxiety and
fright that make you wonder
what’s in store when the lights go
out and the sounds trickle and fade away.
It’s that time – the moment when everything
declares itself, when everything one dreams
and dreads, everything one has borrowed,
stolen, returned, learned, relearned,
craved and mourned and glorified,
everything comes alive under the
light of a shooting star in the
wake of a long trajectory.
It’s that time,
that time in time,
that time in one’s life
when the living resemble
the dead, when the carrion sac
is stuffed with minutes that cannot
escape, that cannot spill out and slip
through the screaming, heaving cracks.
It’s that time in time when time stops.
Plenty of chance and promise lying
around – promise always does.
Welcome to the end of the line.
The time of crushing despair.
This is where everything begins again, afresh.
Afresh.