Maybe if I had the careful slink of silk between my fingers,

Or the color of the horizon before last light,

I could make you understand that

 

There are places that have held me

And places I have held,

And hollowed spaces where my body breathed awhile,

And none of them will be the same

When I pull off these old shoes

And track back through.

 

Can you hear that?

Let me take you where I am:

 

My hand on the cold window, before the curtains were hung,

The smell of still-wet paint, like a band aid on the sunken apartment,

The last time I saw a songbird, it was November, I am not brave,

The salt of a tear tracked to my lips because everything has become far,

The way my arms cross over my chest in a self holding, a poor approximation,

 

How else can I teach you my memory, 

the way it ripples at the edges?

​

-Maya Sorini