i tried to shape a word.
it scattered
  like heat
    across porcelain.

my mouth
  is no longer mine.
it folds
  beneath vowels
    it can’t bear.

a name was here.
  it slipped
    between “i”
    and whatever sound
      never arrived.

the sentence
  opened
not to explain,
  but to spill.

this isn’t silence.
  it’s the trace
    of something
      that nearly
        meant me.

language
  doesn’t fail.
it just
    lets go
      of its subject.

sometimes,
  the sentence coughs / not to speak / but to loosen / the jaw of memory.
—