It

It haunts you like a shadow

Moving softly where your feet have trodden

Silent, and patient.

At the end of the day

When the sun spills red ink over the sky,

And the world

Seems empty, but for you, and your gamely beating heart,

It carefully reaches out its grey hand,

Curling its fingers around your neck,

Pouring dust over everything you see

Until all the colour and joy

Is drained from the world

Draping its heavy, black robes over your aching shoulders,

Robes of shame, guilt, and fading time,

Until you can barely move

Until you feel as if the stars themselves have shattered and died,

Until you are staring out over an iron coloured, merciless sea,

Thrashing in turmoil under a godless sky,

With no soul around to witness your despair,

And yet, as if your suffering did not exist at all,

A new day bursts through the walls of the darkness,

And it retreats

A few paces,

Leaving you to live and breathe,

To wait until the night.