Night Shadow
by Dawg
I am a shadow in the night
and I wear your street like a stolen coat,
moving quiet where the porch lights can’t testify.
I don’t need a face to be remembered,
I don’t need a name to be blamed,
I just need the gap between your breath and your next breath.
The moon is a bad coin in a dirty palm,
flipping and flashing and never landing on mercy
for anybody walking alone.
I watch windows like they’re television screens showing private lives,
and every curtain is a thin lie begging to be pulled back.
I slide under the sound of traffic and dogs and distant laughter,
and the city never notices what it keeps feeding.
You think you’re safe since you lock the door,
since you check the chain,
since you do the little rituals you learned from fear.
I love those rituals.
I love the way you count.
I love the way you hesitate.
I love the way you make room for me without knowing.
I am a shadow in the night,
and I don’t stop when you close your eyes and try to disappear.
I am a shadow in the night,
and your heartbeat is a beacon with terrible manners.
I walk the hallway of my own head
and it’s full of doors that open both ways,
full of rooms where the walls remember screams like wallpaper.
I have been under beds and inside closets
and behind the polite smile of strangers.
I have been the reason your stomach goes cold for no reason.
I don’t rush, I don’t lunge, I don’t waste energy.
I let dread do the heavy lifting while I stand still and listen.
You glance back and see nothing, which is the cruelest part,
since nothing is what you’re taught to doubt.
I keep close enough to borrow your warmth,
close enough to taste the sweat of your fear,
close enough to make your shadow look wrong.
Your own outline stretches on the pavement
and it isn’t shaped like you anymore,
it’s shaped like what you’ve tried not to become.
I could be the thing behind you,
I could be the thing inside you,
I could be the thing you carry like a secret bruise.
I don’t have to touch you to ruin you,
I don’t have to speak to change you,
I just have to stay near and let your thoughts do the rest.
There’s a moment when you stop walking and listen hard,
and the whole night listens back like a crowd holding its breath.
You tell yourself it’s nothing,
you tell yourself you’re tired,
you tell yourself you’re dramatic,
and that’s when I get louder without sound.
I step into the space your confidence left behind,
and it fits me perfectly,
like it was always mine.
I am a shadow in the night,
and when you finally run,
you’ll hear your footsteps chasing you like they hate you.