Static hums beneath the drowsy pine, A cry goes up along the tree line, Flock lifts once, then quiets again, No teeth this time, only the wind. Second cry cracks the dusky air, Fewer heads now turn to care, Numbness spreads where trust once grew, The forest keeps its own residue. Something is calling and something is not, and the difference is the only thing that's lost. Third cry rises, thin and true, Nobody stirs, nobody knew, Real teeth close beneath dim boughs, No one answers the actual now. Signal leaks through a drowsy seam, Half a bark and half a dream, The dim wood swallows what is true, The dim wood echoes what is not too. Something is calling and something is not, and the difference is the only thing that's lost. Hush moves through the fading dusk, What is counterfeit and what is husk, Cannot be told by ear alone, The static mimics the wolf's own tone. Somewhere true fangs finally arrive, Nobody left the warning to survive, Numbness was the quieter threat, It found the flock before the feast. Something is calling and something is not, and the difference is the only thing that's lost. By daybreak the tree line recalls nothing at all.
