Screak Once
"I not afraid" His upper lip trembles,
ears twitch.
The rest of his body
does not like the view inside his head,
A dead headmaster returns as a rat.
Out from his knuckles,
yellowing stiletto teeth stretch, to tap, tap, tap
on a much-scratched mahogany desk,
the sound makes the silence gnaw itself.
Fifty years on, a screech owl wakes up,
screaks once.
"I not afraid" says a scared mouse,
who then reflexively scurries deeper
into his pillow.
The old man’s head
manages a slight uncertain nod,
while his sanity
slips away into a pen-stained inkwell.
One screak is all it took.
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