The Latch Clicks

No wind, only windows

breathing the fog on the panes

and the chair that no one moved

settled a little further into its shadow

Up the road, the sky is dragging

its unfinished thought

across electric wires

pausing between poles like a thought mid-air

The trees, reluctant choristers

speak their consonants

not quite speech

but the grammar of presence

In the next room, the clock

announces itself quietly

You would miss it

if you were waiting

There’s dust in the slant of light

folding its arms across the sill

patient, as if time

has always been like this

not passing but collecting itself

in corners, in seams,

in the places no one thinks to look

And you

you, suspended mid-task

match in one hand

the other full of keys

you feel it

before you name it

The quiet is not emptiness

It is a kind of witness

Not the crash

not the crescendo

but the moment before

the note becomes sound

This is how a day turns

without asking if it can

a latch clicks shut

and suddenly

you are aware of the room

you were always in