The Room That Watches: A Slow Horror In Verse

it began
with the feeling
that someone had just left
the room.

not the sound of footsteps,
not a creak in the boards—
just that
uncertain density in the air.
like a breath held.
like a thought unfinished.
like something waiting.

the clock stopped keeping time.
it ticked,
but not forward.
just ticked.
like it didn’t believe in endings.

the light changed.
not darker.
not brighter.
just… wrong.
like the shadows remembered where they were supposed to fall,
but forgot why.

i tried to move the furniture.
the chair returned to its corner by morning.
the mirror faced the window again.
the door stayed open
even when i locked it.

at night,
i heard breathing—
not mine.
not close.
but deliberate.
measured.
like it was listening.

i stopped looking at the mirror.
not because of what i saw.
but because
one night,
my reflection was still there
after i’d turned away.

the house isn’t haunted.
the room is.
not by a ghost,
but by a memory
so old
even the walls
have forgotten
what happened here.

but it hasn’t.

something here
knows me.
not from this life—
but from another,
where i did not
leave.

sometimes
the window shows me things
i shouldn’t remember.
sometimes
the floor creaks in time
with a lullaby
i’ve never been taught.

sometimes,
i hear my own voice
speaking from the hallway,
asking to be let back in.

i never answer.

not because i’m afraid
of what’s outside.

but because
i’m still in there.
and something else
is wearing my skin.