At the Verge
Sometimes, at the edge of feeling, there is fear—
Not the child's fright at darkened halls,
Nor the candle's twitch at unseen breath—
But the quiet fear that wakes at four,
Where silence hangs like wet linen in alleys of the soul.
The hour is neither dream nor waking,
But the bell between two bells—
A waiting, a weight, a windless turning
Where no angel guards the lintel.
Sometimes a turbulence appears—
Not of the sky, nor sea, nor the city’s restless thrum,
But beneath the ribcage:
A ripple, a grinding, a storm that will not pass—
Madness.
Madness not in flame or thunder,
But in the order of things unhinged—
The tea poured into a shoe,
The child answering the empty chair,
The mother forgetting her child’s name
As if it were never spoken.
And so madness manifested in monstrous and fearful
ways:
The eyes that gleam too bright in crowds,
The voice too calm in confession,
The laugh that echoes where laughter does not belong.
Sometimes the world turns inside out—
And we, gentle bearers of reason,
Are no more than cracked vases on the altar,
Spilling the dust of meaning into the wind.
Yet still, the bird sings at the chimney pot,
The clock ticks its futile benediction,
And the bread rises.
So we go, between verse and void,
With pocket-watches and whispered prayers,
Hoping the threshold holds.
DB June 2025
