At Night

At Night, the prose piece

 

 

Deeply lost in the night.

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Just as one sometimes lowers one's head to reflect, thus to be utterly lost in the night. All around people are asleep. It's just play acting, an innocent self-deception, that they sleep in houses, in safe beds, under a safe roof, stretched out or curled up on mattresses, in sheets, under blankets; in reality they have flocked together as they had once upon a time and again later in a deserted region, a camp in the open, a countless number of men, an army, a people, under a cold sky on cold earth, collapsed where once they had stood, forehead pressed on the arm, face to the ground, breathing quietly.

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And you are watching, are one of the watchmen, you find the next one by brandishing a burning stick from the brushwood pile beside you.

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Why are you watching?

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Someone must watch, it is said. Someone must be there.