Afterbreath

 

Portrait From Luca Ponsato 

Afterbreath

They gather when it is over.

Names are spoken clearly then,

as if clarity waited for the end.

There are dates, neat flowers,

voices learning how to stand together.

But long before that,

something else was happening

away from the circle.

It was happening like dusk

inside a locked room

no announcement,

only the slow retreat of light

from familiar corners.

The body was learning a private alphabet:

how stairs become mountains,

how a glass of water turns ceremonial,

how time sits beside the bed

and refuses to leave.

Pain did not shout.

It whispered,

changing its shape every hour,

like a shadow unsure of its owner.

Memory misplaced names

but remembered the weight of hands,

the smell of rain from decades ago,

a song with no lyrics left.

Outside, life practiced order.

Inside, breath negotiated.

There were questions asked inward,

never meant to survive the asking.

There were apologies with no receiver,

forgiveness without witnesses.

When the moment finally arrived,

it looked simple to those watching

a stillness, a closing, a fact.

They did not see

the long solitude that came before it,

the silent work of letting go,

the slow, unseen unraveling

that belonged to no one else.

What remained was shared.

What was lost

had already been carried alone.