One Morning…

Aubade

0331.2025

A poem for the dawn that never softened.

For those who enter the light only to find the dark.

This morning’s heart awoke to death—

not a glorious flower

stretching its neck

to its own dawn,

but something gray,

unfinished—

a breath that never quite

found its warmth or reason.

No fragment of beauty,

no hint of song or

well-meaning hour

could lift the heaviness.

Even the air moves

like apology—

but not around me.

Everything is darker

in the light of day.

The voices wear tones

like weapons,

gentle only with each other.

I walk into their fire

and they lay the bullets.

They name me

before I speak—

a blur, a burden,

a failed warmth.

Not one of them asks

if I am broken

or just quiet.

(They assume I am

what they would be

if they were I)

And the cruelest part—

the mirror they mistake me for.

m.c.f.

Image 2024, m.c.f.