It was drawn in a hand that didn’t quite trust itself,
lines wavering as if the cartographer
kept glancing over their shoulder.
No compass rose.
No legend.
Only a thin path curling inward,
as though the map were trying to remember
a place that never agreed to exist.
Some say it leads to a city made of glass,
where every street reflects a different version of you.
Others insist it’s a shortcut through a dream
you once abandoned halfway through.
When I held it up to the light,
the ink shifted —
not fading, but rearranging,
as if the map were still deciding
what it wanted to reveal.
Whoever drew it wasn’t lost.
They were searching for something
that couldn’t be found on any real terrain,
something that required a place
that wasn’t a place at all.
And just before the paper settled,
a faint outline appeared at the edge of the path —
a doorway, or a warning,
or perhaps a memory I hadn’t made yet.
I folded the map carefully,
and for a moment,
my hands smelled faintly
of a place I had never been.
Feb 7
Feb 7, 2026 at 2:57 PM UTC
It was drawn in a hand that didn’t quite trust itself,
lines wavering as if the cartographer
kept glancing over their shoulder.
No compass rose.
No legend.
Only a thin path curling inward,
as though the map were trying to remember
a place that never agreed to exist.
Some say it leads to a city made of glass,
where every street reflects a different version of you.
Others insist it’s a shortcut through a dream
you once abandoned halfway through.
When I held it up to the light,
the ink shifted —
not fading, but rearranging,
as if the map were still deciding
what it wanted to reveal.
Whoever drew it wasn’t lost.
They were searching for something
that couldn’t be found on any real terrain,
something that required a place
that wasn’t a place at all.
And just before the paper settled,
a faint outline appeared at the edge of the path —
a doorway, or a warning,
or perhaps a memory I hadn’t made yet.
I folded the map carefully,
and for a moment,
my hands smelled faintly
of a place I had never been.
A poem about a map that reveals only what it chooses, and the strange pull of places that don't exist. This piece is the first part of a triptych, accompanied by "The City That Appears Only When Unseen" and "The Cartographers Debt."
