Dry Days

She slips with slippers half-
hanging
from her toes, from the bed
with hair shaggy as the shaggy rug
touches her heels.  
 
Nothing feels the same,
the room pounds and the hollow
feeling grows from the ground -
Sprouting.
Doubt crawls, goosebumps from open window -
calls her home.
 
Stumble down stairs with naught but silent  
fear for parents asleep,
not playing her game.  
New parent beyond her years
yet feeling sleep -
it screams of home.
 
Cider by dusk
or dawn,
the cigarettes at four, no one catches smoke.
She's stranded in utopia, standing without
knowledge,
unafraid thanks to that echo of loneliness  
holding her hand and drawing her home.