nocturnal animal

a poem (escapril day five)

at night we play, and we pretend we don’t hear the hissing, and we pretend we don’t see each other yawn. i find midnight air soothing, i find it’s meant for me, and so i run and don’t stop. 

in the deepest part of the forest where there’s that one small clearing, you’ll find me with moonlit skin and hollow eyes. this is the third night i’m awake, and i’m not sure how human i am anymore. 

you once called me a fox, and i blushed. i didn’t realise you meant it to hurt me until i’d already plunged the knife. honestly, i didn’t see myself as cunning, in the mirror i only saw prey. but there’s something inside me these days that just keeps on snapping. 

and on the fourth night i’m hungry. i’m accompanied by only one shadow, but its unfamiliar and for some reason grotesque. had i ever been this starving? is it just because you’re gone?