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.


—

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


—

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

—

i wasn’t touched.
 i was remembered.

your hand
 didn’t arrive,
  it replayed.

my skin
  wasn’t a place.
   it was
    what lingered
      after
       you left.

i didn’t move.
i echoed
   what once
    moved through me.

no pain.
no heat.
just
  what remains.
   the slow witness
    of not-me.

i am not this body.
i am
  the bruise
   that remembers
     your forgetting.

this skin
  isn’t mine.
it holds
  your shape
   better
    than i do.

no voice reached me.  
but i steadied.  
 not out of fear,  
 but to return  
  to the line  
   i vanish from  
    when i go soft.

i didn’t stay
  as i.
i stayed
  as what he //
   or it
    or silence
      left in me.

—

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

—

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.

—

i didn’t grip.
i shaped
 my palms
  around
   your not-staying.

holding
 is not possession.
it’s
  a grammar
   of remaining
    without demand.

you leaned into me
 like rain
  leans into a roof,
not to break,
 but to respond.

my arms
 weren’t enough.
they bent,
 but didn’t
  keep.

the syntax was wrong.
not i hold you.
not you held me.
but
 there was
  a space
   that held
    our unforming.

—

sometimes,
 holding
  means shaping space
   without sealing it.
—

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.

—

i didn’t rise  
 to answer.  
i stood  
 because collapse  
  is also  
   a choice.  

the body  
 wasn’t armor  
 but it refused  
 to open.  

i wasn’t asked  
 to stay  
i chose  
  the shape  
   that didn’t fall.  

some breath  
  is a shield  
   not a tremble.  

touch  
  doesn’t reach  
   until i  
    pull back the edge.  

not all  
  openings  
   are soft.  
some  
  are stance.


—

i stopped  
 being a form.  
i became  
 not walls,  
  but where  
   the light  
rests on the doorframe  
  after  
   someone leaves   
   absence  
   made structural.  

not echo.  
not trace.  
but  
 the floorplan  
  sketched by memory  
   walking barefoot.  

i didn’t remember a name.  
i remembered  
 how the light fell  
  when someone stood  
   too close  
    to the window.  

i didn’t say i miss.  
i  
 flickered  
  like dust  
   where breath  
    once lingered  
      like heat.  

a chair  
 held my name  
  better than my mouth.

a door  
 understood  
  the sound  
   of almost leaving  
    but not.  

i  
 wasn’t waiting.

i  
 was furniture  
  arranged  
   by what memory  
     had shaped.


walls  
 never forget  
  what leaned  
   against them.  


once,  
  the chair / creaked / not from weight / but from remembering / someone else’s posture.

—

i didn’t shift  
    because i lost.  
i shifted  
    because that’s how i stay.  
the voice in me  
    doesn’t belong to one body.  
it comes back  
    as spine,  
    as breath,  
    as skin  
each time  
    differently.

—

after is not peace.
it’s
 a hum
  in places
   you thought
    had closed.

nothing leaks.
but nothing seals.

i sit,
and the weight
 remembers
a rhythm
 i didn’t choose.

no name remains.
but something down
  my back
   hummed a shape
   like it once bent
    for someone else’s pleasure.

i touch myself
 not to feel,
but to ask
 was this
  always
   me?

my hand finds
 the imprint
  of them,
   or it,
    or the floor.

and nothing
 pushes it away.

—