DON RUSS

TRAPPED

It wasn’t the seeing him back.
It was as if – in the dream – he’d never left
     and I wasn’t dreaming.

But behind him in the road,
under a mildewed moon, something shapeless
moved or seemed somehow inside itself
     to move. I was afraid.

It might have been a house
like the one he used to say he dreamed of,
ghastly in the dead light of endless afternoon
or yellow lamplight singing late at night.
We have to get out of here, he kept saying.

It’s okay, I said or tried to say.
The road was moving. It’s okay. It’s okay.
It’ll be daylight soon.