Some evenings feel like a slow leak—

years sliding out the door

like they’re late for another life.

I watch them go, pretending I’m not watching,

like a guy pretending his knees don’t crack

every time he stands too fast.

 

Memory shows up uninvited,

dragging a box of old cities—

Old Delhi fire escapes, some cracked dorm window,

a bus that thought it was freedom.

All of it humming the same low note:

You moved, but did you really?

 

December sits on the sill,

quiet as a cat that knows too much.

Even the air feels like it’s tiptoeing,

trying not to wake the part of me

still hunting for the person I was

before the stairs got steeper.

 

It’s a sly kind of drifting—

the world pretending to stand still

while nudging you an inch to the left.

Zhuangzi would laugh,

say it’s just the hinge of the Way turning,

your life a door that never shuts,

only whispers.

 

And yeah, I still fake bravado on air-pollutions,

still squint at the disappering horizon

like it owes me an answer.

But the nights tell the truth faster:

your body files the paperwork,

your mind signs where it’s told.

 

I try to name this quiet shift—

this half-light between remembering

and letting the thing go.

It feels like holding snow too long:

shiny at first, then just water,

then nothing worth keeping

except the chill.

 

Maybe that’s the whole trick—

to let the drift happen

without grabbing at it,

to stand there—awkward, mortal—

and hear the year sliding past

soft as someone you loved

walking out of a room

without shutting the door.