Still on the Loom

I started it for her.

A girl I'd never met,

sixteen and scared in the dark winters of Alaska.

The yarn was the pale yellow of new snow

lit up by a hazy sunrise,

soft enough to wrap a newborn dream.

-

We spoke in short messages,

our words unraveling the time zones they crossed,

until one day, silence.

No address. No reason.

Just the hollow space where care once thrived.

-

The blanket stayed half-formed,

the loom holding its breath for a name

that I would never learn.

Years passed. Memories gathered dust.

I could not finish it.

I could not free it.

Could not bear to unwind what love had started.

-

Tonight, I drag the loom outside.

The air smells of pine

resignation

snowfall

longing.

I build a small fire,

and for the first time, I let the yarn catch.

The threads blaze and curl,

bright as a breath leaving the body in the moonlit night.

Each loop loosens the ghost

of friendship lost.

-

The wood pops like a final heartbeat.

The heartbeat I once heard over a video call,

before she became a ghost.

The heat eats through what my hands refused to release.

I stay until the glow softens,

until the smoke folds itself into the sky.

-

All that remains

is the scent of ash and wol,

and a quiet understanding:

not every promise must be kept

to mean something.