The peasant woman wears black
and seems old
and might be wise
but is certainly afraid.
She points to the very narrow door,
speaks a terrified warning
as if it’s a secret:
there is someone screaming behind that.
She urges me to flee
and so I do,
but tell her it’s a horse behind that door,
the screaming isn’t human.
We run through narrow streets,
she with her old ways,
a dark kerchief,
a dour panic.
Behind me is a man I used to know,
cynical, friendly under other circumstance,
but today he clutches his daughter,
his little girl clinging to his chest,
hiding her eyes from the danger.
He is angry at the woman who leads us,
gives her an animated finger,
sprints past with his precious burden.
So I am last in line
through narrow streets,
through old gates and swinging doors,
all rotting,
and the dark wind finds me first,
blows dread through each of us
with cold penetration.
But it does not stay;
the black cloud blows through fastest of all,
out through the corridors
to whatever lies beyond.
And maybe with dread gone on ahead
there is time before the crumbling
to turn back alone
and listen to the screamer.