(blindness) Poem by Beverley Katherine

the sightless girl lies awake on the floor
lamplight touches her skin
and she feels the warmth
others mistake for air.

it is morning,
though she is in endless darkness
her limbs are whispered to
demanded to feel
until the cobwebs have shifted away from her nerves.

she lies motionless
tiny chest rising with shaky breaths
her lungs like animals stowed away in her chest
locked up for company and safe-keeping.

she stirs
the air, shifting
is chill around her ankles
so bare that she feels comfortable knowing that she is alive.

with her dead eyes she feels the room.
so familiar, in the darkness.