It was always lemon first.
Sharp, clean, slicing through the noise.
A sting at the back of the throat,
as if truth had a flavor.
Mint came close behind,
cool fingers brushing the edge of anxiety,
naming what I couldn't: the ache of beginning again.
Starting over, it whispered,
can come in something as small as breath.
Then came the smoke.
Resin, ash, memory.
It curled into the room like it belonged,
settling the body in its weight.
It spoke in temple hush and burn wounds,
told stories I had sealed away in amber.
Grief made quiet by fire.
The air was next.
Crisp, cutting.
It cleared the weight of a hundred unspoken heavinesses,
threw open a window in the mind.
Fresh and precise,
like the first breath after forgetting how.
Forgiveness, with no one to give it to.
Last came the flowers.
Soft jasmine, dusk-colored, patient.
They drifted in like old songs
I almost remembered.
Half-loss, half-hope.
Even on the hard days,
they lit the air from within.
A gentle proof
that something inside me was still growing.
