Light Left in the Door's Gap

When did it start, this walking with earphones in and nothing playing. The dawn air is still cold, and only after I fasten my buttons and pull down my sleeves can I see where my steps should land. I, too, have started wearing earphones with nothing playing more and more. On the bus, with the scenery slipping past the window without a sound, that was when I could finally hear my own footsteps. That sound is clearer than any music, yet it never lingers for long. You're standing by the window with your earphones in. I'm only listening to footsteps. Watching the lights go out one by one outside, you must know too that I don't stay long. There was an evening when I passed a row of darkened shops and only my shadow stretched out long. My reflection in a glass door stopped for a moment and looked back at me. Through that gap, a single streetlight had wedged its light into the crack of the door. If I count the lights going out, I've left that much time behind on the bus. That sound changes a little each time the window passes beneath a streetlight. I know, too, that the reflection in the glass door looks back at me. Even walking on past that door, I have seen the streetlight left behind follow me, matching my stride. At the end of the alley the sound of the bus disappears, and instead the light from the neighbor's window overlaps with the streetlight and stays there on the ground.