An uncommon quiet fills the air

and overwhelms any awareness of time.

Sunlight still streams through the back window

and the cat still lays in the patch of white light

stretching his big paws as he lets out a yawn.

There is still cooking and baking,

practicing the piano and taking gentle naps.

The silence becomes discounted,

part of the everyday,

part of life.

When there is a siren now,

a noise once part of the background of the city,

it rips at the air and ravages the ears,

ruining the reverie,

a grating reminder of the truth outside the solitude.