Nachttocht [better] Link

Then you turn — not homeward, but through the night still clinging to your coat — and you carry its silence like a lantern nobody can blow out.

No torch. You let the dark press in — not hostile, just ancient, like the inside of a lung before breath. nachttocht

At the ridge, you stop. The village below is a scatter of sugar cubes, each window a weak star. You do not go down. Not yet. Then you turn — not homeward, but through

Somewhere left, a fox cuts a seam through the bracken. Somewhere right, the river talks to itself in vowels you almost understand. Then you turn — not homeward