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Awake

by Charlie Dreer
Chapter 1
Last week the wind stopped.
It didn’t fade,
it stopped.
The grass never moved again.

The power lines hum,
but there’s no power.
The clocks keep time
that no one else agrees with.

I found a door in the wheatfield.
It stood by itself,
hinges sunk in soil,
knob facing east.
When I opened it,
the sound came out.

It was not a voice.
It was the sound of a thought
remembering it had a body.

I tried to shut the door,
but it asked me a question
that I had never heard
and somehow already answered.

Every night since,
I hear people talking in the kitchen.
There’s no light under the door,
but I can smell the coffee burning.
They stop when I move.
They start again when I breathe.

I left a tape recorder running.
Played it back at dawn.
Nothing but silence
and a soft tapping,
as if something small
was walking on the microphone.

Now the stars have gathered closer.
Their light falls in squares,
like windows that shouldn’t be there.
I can see shadows inside them,
moving as if I were the one behind the glass.

Sometimes the sky flickers
like an old film reel.
I think I can see frames of other lives,
people in my house,
sitting in my chair,
listening to my voice,
waiting for the door to open again.

I haven’t slept.
I don’t think the world has, either.

And when morning comes,
the sun rises twice.

The second one stays.