she imagines there is a head sticking out from under the dark cyan curtains. it is made of shadow and has jagged horns. two spots of yellow that become eyes. under the clinical fluorescent glare, it stays. she makes it stay.

earlier she imagined there would be a path to salvation in the crick where her door-hinge situates itself for dust-collection. that there could be redemption in the cream ceramic mug she kept on a wooden coaster beside her laptop.

but she only sees the half-crescent of a coffee stain there. not much of a chalice to sip forgiveness from. 

a crow calls in the night. her blanket thin across her lap. she writes a sonnet to the face seeping out from under the drapery. it slides from one end of the room to the other. she feels it peering over her shoulder. she feels it grinning.

the teeth are like an open shutter; they let the light through.

Photo-by-Bruno-Ribeiro-from-Pexels

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Tan Ruey Fern (Fern) is an undergraduate student who loves language. She comes from Southeast Asia, where she spends most of her time reading and writing indoors. You can find more of her work on the blog Carboniferous Chronicles. She hopes readers can get something enriching out of her writing.