last night

i spent my first night back in my house alone and even though i have electricity it was reminiscent of katrina, in that it was too damn quiet. it strikes me as odd that there have been many nights when i longed for the people across the street to turn down their music and let us all sleep in peace and quiet...yet there is something unsettling when a city holds its collective tongue. a few people are back in my area but only a handful and so the silence comes pressing up against your ears. until katrina came i never knew how maddening silence can be, when even the birds go mute. it was so still that the sound of my own heart was like something out of an edgar allen poe story. there are lights this time around and they help to chase away the loneliness. after katrina, the darkness ran out like blood, thick and sticky. it leaked into every corner and if you opened your mouth, it threatened to drown you. i have been in rural places but there you expect the darkness and its presence does not cause you to recoil. you do not expect a city to go dark as the grave and it is an unsettling thing, especially in combination with the silence. i remember standing in the middle of my street, surrounded by black silence and wondering in fits of paranoia what was stalking me. it was easy to conjure up every end of the world or zombie movie and i would hurry back inside as though the doors and walls, that could not keep the darkness out might somehow bar what was in the night. enough of this. the lights are on and it is daytime anyway. i think i will walk down to the french quarter and shake this feeling off. this is not katrina. i'm grateful. i'm happy to be home.