I.
You sharpened silence
into a question,
asked me to name
every shadow I touched.
So I did –
until my hands were clean
and yours were not.
II.
I learned the ritual:
no nameless voices,
no faceless company,
no doors left half-closed.
Strange –
how quickly a mirror
forgets its own reflection.
III.
You held the blade
by the edge
and called it trust.
I held it by the handle
and called it love.
We both bled
when it changed hands.
IV.
Now there is someone
on the other side of the silence,
a name I was never given,
a laugh I was never meant to hear.
And somehow
I am the secret
for wanting to know.
V.
Perhaps that is what love becomes
when sharpened enough –
not a weapon,
but an agreement
to cut each other
with the same blade
and call the wounds
equal.