But the tongue remembers.

Poems

Clean Tongue.

You learned early—

how to speak without speaking.

How to smile

with the mouth closed.

They praised you for it.

So well-behaved,

So composed.

You kept the bitter taste

on the underside of the tongue.

Swallowed when it rose.

This is the art of vanishing

while still in the room.

Even anger came dressed in silk—

a quiet no,

a delay,

a look that meant

you had already left.

In private,

you bit your knuckles

instead of shouting.

Whispered into the sink.

You convinced yourself

this was strength.

But strength doesn’t shrink.

Now, when something cruel happens,

you don’t speak of it.

You clean the counters.

You answer emails.

You tell yourself: This is dignity.

But the tongue remembers.

At night,

you wake with it pressed to the roof of your mouth,

aching—

as if still holding back

what was never allowed

to burn its way free.

---

Parlour Meat.

It was already laid out

when you arrived.

The table dressed,

the room humming with polish and pride.

They called it supper.

They called it tradition.

But the air was too still.

The knives too clean.

And the meat—

it didn’t steam.

It gleamed.

You were taught to sit straight.

To fold your hands.

To chew without asking.

So you did.

Even when it tasted wrong,

too sweet,

too red.

They smiled.

They passed the wine.

They said nothing

of the thing that once moved,

once breathed,

once cried out

when it was taken.

You swallowed.

You learned.

In time,

you brought your own guests.

You served what had been served.

You said: Isn’t this lovely?

And you meant it

almost.

Except at night,

when the parlour is dark again

and the silver reflects no one.

You walk through it barefoot,

as if through a church.

You remember the body.

How it fed you.

How it never left.

---

Dissolute in Fractions.

It didn’t happen all at once.

You didn’t wake up missing.

There was no grand break,

no accident,

no storm.

Just a series of small dispersals:

the gesture not returned,

the letter never answered,

the way the light began to skim past your body

as if you were already

mostly gone.

You stayed polite.

You fulfilled what was asked.

But inside—

you fractured.

Not dramatically,

not with sound.

A slow erosion,

the self

crumbling at the edges

like something left too long in water.

You began to refer to yourself

in the third person.

You called her

she.

You called her

the girl.

And the girl?

She had needs.

She had longings.

But you—

you only had roles.

They told you:

Hold yourself together.

Be whole.

But you knew already:

wholeness is a lie.

You live as splinters now.

A glance here,

a laugh there—

your name scattered

like coins

no one bends down

to gather.

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