The Sky, Briefly, to Us

The paper trembles in my hands—

a geometry of breath and flame,

stitched to the dark by its own hunger.

Around me, they pray to remember.

I only want to forget enough

to rise.

The water holds a thousand small suns,

each one drifting toward erasure.

Their reflections fracture like thought

against the current’s slow insistence.

My pulse keeps time with the wind.

It feels like the sea remembering itself

through me.

Smoke gathers at the lip of vision,

folding into the night’s patient grammar.

Someone laughs softly—

a sound already belonging to distance.

The reeds lean close

to listen for what burns.

I write nothing on the lantern.

No name. No plea. No promise.

Only the warmth of my hands

pressed into its skin—

a confession without language.

When I let go,

the air accepts the offering.

It rises without effort,

a brief correction in the balance of things.

The crowd dissolves.

The river forgets its edges.

You once said the body’s a lantern too—

brief, necessary,

burning what it can.

Now the flame inside me steadies,

learning the grace of disappearance.

I breathe, and everything I’ve been

becomes smoke, becomes air,

becomes the quiet

that carries light home.