🚓 They Came Last Night Police 🚓 Poem by James McLain

the knocking came loud,
banging through the thin air
of my rented silence.
I opened.

she stood there,
a badge on her chest,
a gun on her hip,
but it wasn't the weapon
that spoke.

her eyes were granite,
cut for seeing
things I couldn't know.
behind her,
the shadows grew
a second voice,
unspoken, waiting.

"Identification, "
she demanded,
and the night held its breath
as I fumbled to prove
I was nothing.

she stared at the driver's license,
nodded once,
then pulled her lips
into a line of advice:
"Stay out of trouble."

three nights ago,
a man's life bled out
on asphalt,
his crime
the dirt on his tag,
a few letters
hidden beneath dust.

and now,
dust carries weight
heavier than guilt,
and shadows can kill
before a word is spoken.

the door closed,
but the night did not,
dreaming of this as I slept.