Wednesday, April 19, 2023

April 19: Jump scare

 The arrangement is simple:

I’m bathed in a streetlight

Or the light of my backyard

Or any other light that creates a spot in the darkness.

Reprieve.

I’m always waiting,

Maybe my parents can’t find the keys to the house.

Maybe we are at the tail end of a conversation before we walk to our car.


The sense of it

Sneaks just below my vision

Peripheral adjacent.

The snake blanket sneaking onto the scene.

The crescendo of bat wings before they take flight.


And every time,

It arrives to try and take one of us.

A simple figure

Red hood

No face. A perfect replica of the bad guy in an old DOS game that eats the hero.


You’d think that’s the scary part.

And it certainly would be.

Because it’s always a near miss. We barely make it out, but succeed.


Me though,

I think that feeling

The knowledge

“It’s real”

Even though it’s just a dream

Even though you survive.


The realization

That the thing you’ve been waiting for but were told wasn’t real

That thing

Is right in front of you

And nothing is going to be the same.

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