i tried to shape a word.
it scattered
  like heat
    across porcelain.

my mouth
  is no longer mine.
it folds
  beneath vowels
    it can’t bear.

a name was here.
  it slipped
    between “i”
    and whatever sound
      never arrived.

the sentence
  opened
not to explain,
  but to spill.

this isn’t silence.
  it’s the trace
    of something
      that nearly
        meant me.

language
  doesn’t fail.
it just
    lets go
      of its subject.

sometimes,
  the sentence coughs / not to speak / but to loosen / the jaw of memory.
—

i didn’t arrive.
 it did.
  or maybe he
   but not as self.
    as something
      already marked.

there was no voice.
only
  pressure
    with no source.

my weight leaned,  
      not away,  
             but toward what i knew.  
       my thighs held the line,  
               until memory pressed  
                      like a weight,  
                            not to break  
                                       but to enter.  

and i  
    did not vanish.  
        i leaned into presence.
it never said  
  a word.  
but my breath  
   caught   
     like it remembered
someone else’s name.

i became not-body,
  but reply.
not i,
  but reverberation.

there is a spine in me  
    that doesn’t bend  
        even when the edge of me folds.
the grip is not to take  
    but to frame.  
what enters me  
    is not theft.  
it is trust  
    when i decide  
        to open.

what entered
 wasn’t him.
 wasn’t it.
it was
  the self
    folding
      into shape.
and the shape
  spoke back.

—

don’t
 touch me.
not because
  i break,
but because
  i forget
    where i end.


your hand
  doesn’t hurt.
but it
    shifts
  the lines
    between skin
      and silence.


i want
 to be
  held,
    but not taken.

i want
     the warmth
      without the aftersound.


when you
  touch,
    i disappear
      into the outline
        of your want.


i reach back
  not to stop
    but to
      delay.

to fold
  the moment
    before it
      becomes
        mine.


touch me
  but only
    as question.

never
  as name.


—

they asked nothing.
still
 i answered.

not in word,
 but in the shift
  of weight,
  the arch
  in my back,
  the unguarded thigh.

it wasn’t language.
 it was consent,
  folded inward.

not yes.
not no.

silence
 ruptures
  when held too long.

what they took,
 they didn’t name.
but i
 answered
  in posture.

—

the body forgets pain
  before it forgets touch.
what stays
  is not the hand
   but its afterimage.

—

not indecision,
     but the way skin flinches
     before you touch
        probability
         folded
         into the shape
         of silence.

—

refusal
 is not retreat.
it is
 a contour
  drawn
    between
      two open hands.


—

i didn’t touch her.
 but the air
  between our hands
   folded
    like it once did
      when closeness
        meant undoing.

she left
 before the door shut.
but her presence,
 a tilt
  in the chair,
   a wrinkle
    on the bedsheet
remained,
 louder
  than any word.

you don’t forget
 the scent
  of not-touching.
you carry
  the warmth
   that never reached
    your shoulder.

i didn’t say goodbye.
but the room
 still hears
  her silence.

—

voice is not emission.
it is sediment
 a fold made of
  held air,
  missed words,
  and the weight
   of being asked.

to speak
 after the i collapses
 is not to return
 but to resonate
  without center.

—

You’ve finished reading.
But not everything ends when you close a page.

Some words stay
 not as memory,
  but as tuning.

And maybe now,
 when you walk,
  you’ll hear something
   between footsteps.

Maybe now,
 you’ll listen
 not for meaning
 but for presence.

And maybe the sound
 that never quite arrived
  is the one
   that stays.