The morning enters in fragments. Stripes of brightness, flickering beside shadows. At first, I mistake the darker bands for truth, my words thinning as they scatter.
A figure hunched in the chair shifts my pens, moves the steel cup, later telling me I misremembered. Shadows spread across every surface until the only way to stop their pull is to close my eyes.
A click of the front door. The air stays heavy, unmoving. My breath stumbles, chest tight, the walls still leaning in. An echo from the recorder, my voice looping back, flat and practiced.
Slowly, the space begins to widen. The room steadies. Light presses through the narrow gaps, enough to hold my outline.
first frost
the weight of berries
on an uncut hedge
a rook turns its head
towards the unsettled sky
