Shadow storm

Theres a storm rollin in, 

battering against my windows 

like all the secrets that I keep 

buttoned up between my teeth

too large, but too little
to be considered real sin

The night has come as black as the coffee that you don't drink

drowning the rough reflections of your face

in it's deep and endless shadows

tossing the boughs of the cottonwoods against this empty house

I am hunting

lest I be hunted,

the thieves of the shadows

who steal into my bedroom and dance away with my dreams

the ones who haunt me in the taunting hours after midnight and before the soft creases and safe shadowless reaches of dawn

Dark in their shadows

they wait for me

But tonight, 

I await them

Too long have my eyes stayed shut

too long have my lungs simply exhaled

And not screamed

too long have my hands been limp and callus

too long my mouth has been dry and quiet, 

my heart waiting

for.. Something

I speak against the silence..

Bring me your shadows,

bring me your dancing regrets

bring me your eye sores and your no mores

and I will bring you my debts 

One hand on my heart 

pounding away beneath my birdcage bones

and the other on my mind,

my words sharpened like dark onyx stones

The wind howls away outside 

The rain against the glass

I wait in the cover of darkness

Somehow, simply, unafraid 

at last