Waking to the Night

Our little girl wakes, afraid of the dark fullness of empty rooms. She scuttles up stairs, blanket over her head so monsters can’t see her, calls “Mommy, Mommy!” and buries herself beneath our big covers, letting cold-toed fears re-warm. Mother’s slow pulse beside her calms. I listen, too

so near the woman’s heart, and hope my even rhythm might steady them both. Oh, I know dark corners, these ghosts given life in the dead hours of night, when we are all children unable to stop the shadows outside the window, old clocks ticking chants of fearsome things:

that no one will hear our cries, or will not care if they do. That life might be too short, and love arrive too late. That small acts will foolishly squander great things. That bright answers too often hide in fearsome places. That a nightmare’s great, tormenting beast will come and be real again. That we’ll falter

beneath the weight of courage, and the tears, and the hard climb, and all our stifled cries, are wrapped in my arms, in dark night beings, these littlest of children we hold to ourselves trying to comfort with our grownup voices, The only way to not be afraid is to dare to be more brave. That’s the only way, the only way.