I inhale…
The ache rises before the air.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Each heartbeat presses against the walls of myself.
I grind inward,
friction of longing against longing unreturned,
a motion without release.
I taste the weight of devotion unshared.
Bitter.
Sweet.
Necessary.
I fold into the quiet…
I breathe…
Slow.
Slow.
Slow…
As if the rhythm itself might hold me together.
The world moves on, oblivious…
I exist here,
kneaded,
sifted,
pressed
by the gravity of what I feel.
Alone in this threshing-floor,
raw and sacred,
ground into the possibility of love
even when love is not mirrored.
Embers of desire trace the curves of my ribs.
Bones remembering the ache.
Stars trembling in the hollow of my chest.
Air lingering in my throat…
a pulse I cannot release.
Longing threads through me,
silent,
relentless,
unnamed.
I exhale…
Not release.
Not surrender.
But remembrance.
Devotion.
The slow, sacred endurance
of surviving the intensity
of my own heart.
