Lying in bed at night I huddle beneath the covers.

Mommy always said that the monster under my bed wasn’t real;

So why do I have to bury my head under the pillow

To drown out the sound so late at night…

I hear it in the solitary creak of the single stair.

And the rustle of the curtain when the fan ceases to turn.

It can speak a thousand tension ridden nothings

Between one drop of an ice cube and another.

It keeps watch, with me as its prisoner, from the window sill.

The only evidence it was there is the pocket sized clink of Spots dog tags.

It sings a mute gospel chorus beneath

The ever present direction of a negligible wind chime.

It whispers to me, stealing sheep as I count,

Seven

Eight

Nine

  Ten

….

Twelve

And walks me down the hallway,

Guided by the hollow sound of carpeted foot falls,

Towards insomnia.