The Terrible Calm
I stared her deeply in the eyes,
She looked back just as deeply.
A brief sigh, she looked steadily.
“I’m closing the book early” she said.
Not in a whisper or a shout
But the gentle voice I’ve loved.
“But the story isn’t finished.”
“Some stories don’t finish.”
“This one should.”
“That’s not up to you.”
“Don’t you want to know how it ends?”
“I already know.”
“How? How do you know?”
“The candle goes out,
the ship is lost at sea,
the darkness has surrounded.”
“And then?”
“Nothing. Then nothing.”
“It doesn’t sound finished.”
“Then you weren’t listening.”
There is a strange kind of courage in the calm that comes after you've survived too many storms. It isn't the absence of feeling. It's the quiet that finally arrives when your soul decides it can no longer carry what was never meant to be carried alone.
Amazing piece. I love how you build the tension with the back-and-forth, kind-of like waves.