sometimes i think about how even the flowers that rot on my windowsill still release sugar into the air. like they don’t know they’re dying. or maybe they do, and that’s the point.

like—what if the body keeps trying to love the world even as it collapses? what if the bruise is the proof of touch? what if sweetness leaks easiest through the split skin?

my mother told me once not to keep dead things in the house, bad luck, bad energy, but i looked at the brown petals curling in on themselves & thought: isn’t this just another kind of devotion? to keep offering scent, even when your own face is unrecognizable.

i want to be like that: soft, ruinous, unashamed. but then again, who wants to be loved in decay? everyone says they’ll stay, but when you start smelling like the end, suddenly the room empties.

still, i keep the glass of water cloudy, the stems blackening, because i can’t bear to throw away something that once opened itself for the sun.

and maybe that’s what i am, something opening / something closing / something sweet and unbearable all at once.

so if you smell sugar on my breath, don’t ask if i’m alive or already rotting— maybe the difference doesn’t matter.