The Glass Horizon

The Glass Horizon

By Stephen L. Harrison

Nothing is locked away—

not now, not said in whispers.

The walls lean in. The glass has eyes.

I feel it when I speak.

Tell one soul a hidden thing,

it lifts itself on wings—

not bird but something harder,

a shard that learns the wind.

A note, a file, a careful code

sleeps only for a while.

The ink thins out, the screen goes dim,

but something keeps the shape.

I thought that prayer was private ground,

a dark no hand could reach.

But even there, the silence hums—

a ledger under breath.

From first small cry to final cold

they mark the line I make.

Not memory, not flesh alone—

a version I can’t break.

It follows me. I feel it now.

A second self, precise.

It knows the rhythm of my heart

before the beat arrives.

My steps are not my own to lose,

they fall and fix in place.

The camera keeps a steadier gaze

than any human face.

Above, below, within the walls,

no distance left to claim.

The sky is thin. The ground is wired.

Each silence has a name.

My blood is read like written text,

a script I did not choose.

The past folds in, the future set—

a verdict in the veins.

Nothing is mine, not even this—

this thought, this tightening breath.

It takes the shape before I do.

It lives a step ahead.

And when I turn to face the glass

it does not answer true.

It holds me still, already known—

and keeps the part I lose.