the dreams of the ones who have slept here

[los_fantasmas]

the things i know too well:
the sound of a car
pulling into the driveway,
rain pattering on a metal roof;
the opening and closing of doors;
footsteps creaking against the floor;
the quiet sound the house makes at night
when everyone has gone to sleep but me;
when the television flicker
meets empty space instead of eyes & ears;
the lightening of the sky out my bedroom window
when morning finally decides to come.

i know houses the way a shadow knows a house.

i want to tell him:
"the only cats i like
are black cats because
i am like a black cat."

under too much hair and eye makeup,
clad in stretchy black tops and stretchy black leggings,
i am like a cat mistaken for a shadow.
i make home of dark corners, the swinging space
between moving feet, the chair that is never sat in,
the windowsill covered in dust.
i hide in the stairway.
i hang in the curtain.
i sleep in your hat.

and when the door opens in the morning,
the lightening of the sky that finally decides to come,
i will bolt and the door will close behind me,
mistaken for a shadow.