“A Slow Turning”

The stairs lengthen each season,

though the house remains the same.

Names slip from my tongue—

like coins through a frayed pocket,

clinking faintly in corridors I no longer patrol.

I misplace mornings,

folding them into afternoons

that arrive already weary.

The calendar stares back blank,

its squares scraped clean,

eraser dust gathering at the margins.

Once, I carried lanterns of memory—

now their glass fogs, their wicks splutter,

spitting wax and smoke

into rooms that echo with absence.

The rooms grow hollow,

like ribs without breath,

their emptiness pressing inward

until silence settles in the chest.

Still, I walk.

Each step rehearses collapse,

each pause claws back a name.

The body grows heavier,

but the quiet between heartbeats

remains mine to measure.

.