How Quiet The World Was - Pantoum

Before the dawn I stood,

tracing frost on a window pane.

Chill creeping in through coat sleeves,

how quiet the world was.

Tracing frost on a window pane,

silence unbroken by birds.

How quiet the world was,

when covered with blankets of cloud.

Silence unbroken by birds,

freezing in foreign headlights.

When covered with blankets of cloud,

I waited for life to start.

Freezing in foreign headlights,

surrounded by crisp silence.

I waited for life to start,

and I wondered if I was alone.

Surrounded by crisp silence,

chill creeping in through coat sleeves,

I wondered if I was alone,

when before the dawn I stood.

Green Light

The ring sat on the table between the two of them. Caught in a patch of sunlight that streamed through the café window, it cast tiny green patterns across the bleached wood.

The smell of strong coffee and old books, two scents that both of them had once agreed were the epitome of comfort, was now slightly spoiled by the tension that was brewing at their corner table, beside the window.

The passers-by couldn’t have known that when they curiously glanced in through the café’s street level windows, they were witnessing two lives caught in a crucial moment. They only saw a pretty girl with black locks masking her eyes and a clean shaven man staring nervously at the mug in his hands.