The Hollow Hour

The sky hung low like a grieving veil,  

Misty as breath upon a broken glass, 

Trembling trees whispered in exile,  

And time slipped slow through hour’s morass.  

The mirror knew me not today, 

A pale figment, eyes dull with ash,  

I wandered halls of thought in gray,  

Each step a ghost’s reluctant pass.  

The world, a room where voices fail,  

Where laughter curdles into frost,   

Each face a moon behind a veil,  

Each greeting gained was something lost.  

The body moved, a husk, a shell,  

Wading through an unseen mire,   

I spoke in smoke, I dreamed in knell,  

And warmth withdrew like evening fire.  

But still, beneath the silence' dome,  

A sparrow sang within the thorn,  

Though battered, bent, and far from home,  

The heart recalled it once was born.  

So I shall wait, as twilight bends,  

For dawn to stir the sullen tree,  

For even sorrow slowly mends,  

And what is lost still seeks to be.