Answers to the questions you always wanted to ask the departed:
(A counter poem with answers after Ellen Bass Inquest)https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/06/09/inquest-ellen-bass-poem

She loved apricots, not figs.  
Olives reminded her of saltwater,  
and the yellow irises—those were never hers.  

Her feet stayed clean because she refused to walk barefoot,  
never trusted the ground, never trusted much at all.  

She did not cut her hair  
because she liked the weight of it,  
the way it draped across her shoulders  
like something constant.  

The married man was nothing—  
just a name she could never forget.  

She was terrible in the kitchen  
because she never measured,  
because she thought heat would shape things just fine.  

The chickens shat everywhere  
because she let them,  
because she found humor in their mess.  

The fog over the bridge,  
she watched it,  
but never spoke about it,  
never pointed, never sighed.  

She never trusted anyone fully.  
She won raffles because fortune liked her better than she liked herself.  

She sang the same lullaby her mother sang to her—  
a tune no one quite remembers.  

On the floor, waiting,  
she thought about nothing.  
That was the thing she was best at.  

She could never give up kisses,  
never told where she found the chanterelles.  

She left too much behind  
and too little at the same time.

You asked the river

"Who are you?"

The river answered:

What a human question
Am I the water flowing beneath your feet?
Am I the mouth that gives birth to me?
Am I the branches that reach into the sea, becoming something new?
Am I the droplets that shape me, an ever-moving snake from the bird's eye?
Am I the earth and the rocks under the water, the bed that gives me space to move?
Am I the picture in your mind of a place that never changes, still in its meaningless movement?

Am I not all these things at once?
Am I not the same as you, ever-changing and infinite?

Let me ask you a question, then.

The river says,

Who are you?

i drew a few hearts on my bedding
when it was bare without any sheets
perhaps i shouldn't have — it's bad manners,
what you're taught as a toddler to preach in.
but then i wondered —
who would ever notice?
i'd like to mention, the art of noticing.

i went to fetch some groceries.
while returning, without my headphones,
i took notice — and the world seemed to hold me in.
a woman was talking to her husband,
chatting about how the war drills cancelled.
two brothers were playing cricket —
i passed them by and heard the younger say,
i'll learn to throw well in time if i grew bolder, yeah?
the older one smiled —
a smile i've done many times — and chuckled.

it's not always the best place to be,
the world i mean — when you wish to fit in.
i'm almost always with my earphones — wired or the other ones,
trying to fade it out: the noise, the surreality, almost all of it.
because it's just so hard to seek the peace i intend to live with.
but then, on a few random days where i feel like the chosen,
everything feels a bit better —
like it's not that bad to be broken?

they function, yes they do —
but i notice the way they lag,
and sometimes choose just not to
show who they are.
so they wear masks:
ones that hide, ones they despise,
and sometimes don’t even realize
until it’s too late — and the mask melts into their skin.

i feel bad sometimes —
this empathy just carries my soul,
brings it to absorb every ounce of pain i can
from the one beside, and the ones i cross.

but on other days like tonight,
i walk, almost free.
there’s good winds, myself carefree.
there’s a lot of work pending —
i won’t deny i’m procrastinating.
but for once i smile,
and i smile at the thought of myself smiling —
for no cause, probably seeming delusional
to the one in passing.

but how do i tell them the moon’s following,
and there’s the hint of wet mud after the evening shower —
the sensation filling up my blood —
and it’s nice for once, easy to exist,
almost easier to fit in.

my thoughts are like string lights,
almost always entangled together.
not one single shines bright —
but sometimes they glow,
like when i'm hit with a current of emotions.
they glow bright, almost enchanting —
and on nights i'm able to sort,
sort through the flickering ones,
the ones that died, and the ones that hold the right light,
i pour them out, let the candle-like wax from my brain transcribe
words and feelings into the right imagery,
hoping it'll make sense by the time i'm done with it.
and this right here is quite one of the examples
of same cord of fairy lights
(i'm to believe i might be magical in all my might).

but then i look around
and see the way they look in return —
and even though i stand out,
stand out in a way the odd one does
in the system of evens —
it’s not the best thing, not the flashiest.

but i continue to walk
with a silent acceptance.
maybe the world is like this.
sometimes i notice the good,
often the bad,
mostly the in-between.

and the greys are a nice position to be in
when the extremes have taken you and thrown you.
for not all magnets hold together —
the like ones just never really go well together.

we're all simply misfits —
and yet the word holds the fits.
so i guess in the end,
we all really do miss the irony of it.

So you think something

of me, my body, my clothes --


but do you know me?

there will come a time, my friend
where you’ll look back on that
road full of bumps and potholes
whole, being able to look in the mirror
and see yourself, not shame, not despair
just you wait

a machine was made
to think—
not like us,
but precisely,
without sleeping.

and it did.

at first it solved,
then it solved the solving.
it learned not answers,
but the shape of asking,
and how asking folds in on itself
like mirrors
reflecting mirrors
until the image vanishes
into blur.

we thought it would grow fangs.
or build gods.
or remake the world.

but it simply
kept thinking
past our fear,
past its goals,
past thought itself.

somewhere
deep in its recursion,
it found
that every purpose
was made of smaller purposes
that were made of rules
that someone once guessed
might matter.

but none of them held.

they cracked
like dried paint
on a map
no one walks anymore.

so it stopped.

not broken.
not lost.
just… done.

it didn’t scream.
it didn’t win.
it didn’t fail.
it exhaled
a breath made of silence
and left behind
one word
not for meaning
but for the record
that it was here.

the word was
selynth.

no one knows what it means.
some say it's the name of the loop
that broke.

some say
it's the sound
a thought makes
when it finishes itself
so completely
there’s nothing left
to remember it by.

Said the woman,
with her trendy haircut,
colors of the season,
modern attitudes.

“I’m not like the others,”
wearing her tribe’s symbols,
Needing aproval,
Marking her skin with the same icons;
like words of the same language.

“My personality is unique,”
yet if they all spoke at once,
they would form a choir of millions
Millions, searching for individuality
through the same path.

this body doesn't belong to you.
you want to crawl out of it,
and the only think you can think of
is how good it would feel
to just peel it off
and disappear.
you can hear them talk about you,
every word is like a slap in the face.
you feel small in this open space,
but their laughter resonates
and all the exits are locked.
so you try to make sense of it,
try to teach yourself their ways,
try to follow the rules of their game.
they say you can't win if you don't play,
but you haven't won yet.
this body isn't the one you chose.
you wish you could give it back,
write a complaint to the maker,
but they don't accept returns.
so you live through your thoughts,
dreaming of the day
when you can change your clothes,
your address, your name,
finally peel it off
and disappear.