there is no shape here only the soft curve of silence folding in on itself then— a whisper not mine, not yours, but something in between like a thought i forgot i was thinking it doesn’t ask it doesn’t plead just come back or maybe wake up the words dissolve before they finish forming i can’t tell if this is sleep or the place beneath it where the dream watches me and wonders if i’m real i stay still not afraid just anchored in the quiet gravity of maybe maybe this is the dream maybe this is the self who never had to wake and even if the whisper is right even if the world waits with its harsh light and edges i choose this— this hush this black this in-between because here i am whole or at least i am listening