Like a Lighter in Front of a Grenade
After the bars clicked off the lights I walked home. I walked down the puddled street and rubbed my shoulder in unison with my foot coming down, against the wall next to me. I was talking to myself and having fake conversations with people I wished were next to me. I came to a stoplight.
Blink, clink, blink, clink
I could hear it turning on and off. The world was deafeningly silent. I could hear my heartbeat and the rain drops gathering in the sidewalk reservoirs below. I could almost feel the earth move and that I had to walk it like a lumber jack walking a log in the river.
Blink, clink, blink, clink
I shook my head and moved onward. I was now past West st. and coming to Ostend. I looked up and without seeing I could hear.
Blink, clink, blink, clink
This time the blinks and clinks were louder.
I looked in both directions and saw the front of the library to my left and all the way down 5 blocks on my right. I saw, what looked to be, a witch in long ravaged tattered clothes running with her arms up about 3 blocks away. She was running towards me. She was running at me. She was running for me.
She was screaming, but not with her mouth. Her body was making some noise. The deafening of the world was in full force to my senses. I cradled my head in my hands and turned my torso 90 degrees to block out her coming hiss and pangs. That pang was like a child banging a wash bin all day with a crab mallet. That hiss was like a spiked tire popped by a rusty nail. I turned my held head back without moving my chest.
She was gone.
Blink, clink, blink, clink
Blink, clink, blink, clink
I crossed the street. I ran all the way home making the loudest sounds my body could make without using my mouth.
