vestigial organ
this could be my new hobby — people watching.
my heart feels hollow as i stand still against a sea of moving people. my fingers are shaking, my bones could be crumbling inside me, who knows? i’m looking through three floors of a building filled with strangers, and all i could ever think of is the probability that i might see you. i must’ve faulted the gods for them to place your place and mine in the same city — and you always within reach but never actually in mine.
i once was struck by how the brain could undo eons of evolution and turn life against itself. something in me is already decaying even before it was buried. now i’m perplexed once again, this time by how your gravity affects mine. i’m certain that if i get poisoned this evening, i would thank it. but if there’s a small chance that my eyes would meet yours under the flicker of this fluorescent light, i think i’ll carry with me an antidote.
the fault was in my restlessness. i picked a flower before it had bloomed, so certain it would do so at some point above the ground and in my palms. i should’ve waited; i would’ve waited for an eternity. i would put off my attempts at my own mortality for an uncertainty with you. i’d hold onto a single moment forever. if i could brush my fingertips against yours but perish in a second, i’d die laughing with joy at the face of death.
what better proof can i have of my heart? ever since the first letter that i’ve written here, i’ve tried and tried to tell the world i have a heart. my voice is now hoarse and trembling. but look — there’s an organ in between my ribs. i thought i had a vestigial heart, but now i can see it — real and aching in every beat.
four years in the tower and now we’ve escaped. no one told us that the sun and the grass beneath our bare feet were more treacherous than the cage that’s all we ever knew. suffocation didn’t kill us, but exposure would. the woods have swallowed me whole, and the light of the sky is barely seen. but if i could see you at the edge of the trees, i would gladly stumble upon thorns and fallen leaves.
now light flickers in front of my face. a thin stick of red demands a wish to be made. i don’t remember the last time i’d made a birthday wish, perhaps when i was eight. but this time there was no hesitancy, only clarity. i’ll give you this birthday and probably the next. and the next. and the next. until perhaps one where you’d light my candle yourself.
This piece was originally posted on Substack on October 20, 2025 and migrated to BearBlog on March 19, 2026.