By Yvana

the memory doesn’t knock
it lingers like steam on mirror-glass
fogging up the edges of what you thought you forgot
it is there again
drifting in slow through the back of your breath
light braided behind it like sun-warmed hair
a shimmer
a shape made of almost
a feeling that hums just beneath the word
you are always beside it
shoelaces loose
a sugar pause in the middle of a sentence
something soft held too long in the heat
it is the hush between glances
the velvet pause where sweetness breathes and doesn’t blink
its fingers always dimmed with graphite
not messy but moonlit
sometimes, in the lull between moments
you hear the whisper of pencil on paper
like something soft was being sketched into you
before you had the language for longing
in chapel
you’d glance sideways during prayer
skirts pleated like pressed petals
hands folded like you meant it
but only because it was watching you back
you were never religious

but the silence felt sacred
when it was near
and now
the city mirrors too much
buildings blur behind riverglass
each window a glint
a soft sting
a gleam shaped like its laugh
sometimes you swear
you still taste it
the way joy once hovered
against your skin like steam
you wonder if it knew
you were already bending toward it
if it felt the tension
soft and sharp
like the pull before the release
you never say it
you never have to
but there is something about the quiet between you
the way it holds;
the way it never needs to burst
and still
you wake with its name nestled under your tongue
pressed like rose sugar against your teeth

the world sways
it turns

you stay
its brown eyes blurred at the edges;
dark as dusk until they caught you watching
until they softened
spirals of warmth
espresso spun with sun

maybe that’s why,

you keep the coffee dark and sweet
just to keep seeing it

maybe that’s why,

you stir it slow
like it might still show up
in the steam

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Yvana is a Dominican-American writer from New York City, now based in Virginia/North Carolina. Her work explores yearning, memory and what endures after loss. Find her on TikTok @yauticus