Untethered

The shadows slip their anchors first, gathering at the edges where the sun bends away from reaching. They pool like spilled ink, spreading without permission.

A tree casts three reflections now— itself, its dark twin, and the memory of what it was before the light bent wrong. The fence dissolves into parallel lines, each one a ghost of solidity.

Everything doubles at this hour. The road becomes two roads— one for the hurried, one for the lingering— and I cannot decide which footsteps are mine in this hour of gentle multiplication.

When dark finally settles, the shadows will have nowhere to run. They'll climb the walls like vines, settle into corners like patient animals, and rest. But now—now they're wild, untethered, finally free.