A Ghost Is Born

Early in the morning,

light yawns on the counterpane,

warning or warming?

Away, a bird regrets

being first to break

pre dawn darkness

before dawn.

It sang to silence another fear.

In this space that is graceless

a ghost is born.

Tenant of the shiftless dark,

the space where ice thought

twice before forming,

for there’s something

colder than mere water frozen,

a void that fills formlessly,

that reserves space

without being

entirely sentient,

or indeed itself.

I am silence distilled

and fatherless,

shadow on a path

that is not distracted

by time.

I am the unseen vine

that runs through

the marrow of streets.

Eye that is endlessly open,

that cannot weep.

The unsaid dead am I,

a wound in motion,

not distracted by

the daydreams

of your living life.

Uncork the bottle that contains me,

then breathe no more.