Night Fall

• Annabelle Daly, Grade 3
• Poetry
• 2020

My city self’s behind me now
We’re in the car to a country town.
It’s just me and mum pitching up our tent
The wind like ice as the sun goes down.

Dad calls as I’m shrugging my new pyjamas on,
"Come home - a mad man’s on the loose!"
Mum yawns and laughs it off,
"You scaredy cat, you’re even afraid of a goose!"

We're staying put as the candle blows out,
I need to pee but mum’s sound asleep in bed.
So I creep out into the dead of the night,
too many thoughts running through my head.

A flashlight and a man yells, "Stop!"
It’s the mad man, of that I’m sure.
So I dart backwards but I’m slipping off the ledge,
now here’s his hand, trying to break my fall.