When your gaze found mine, the whole world swayed, As if the earth had missed a hidden beat; The sunlight suddenly grew unafraid, Then melted like warm gold around my feet. I tried to look away, but something stayed, A trembling little universe in you; My eyes became two doors I could not close, And every secret seemed to wander through. I felt my cheeks turn roses in the rain, A sudden fire underneath my skin; The stars began to whisper my sweet shame, While little suns kept blooming from within. Your eyes were not just eyes, they were a place, A strange blue room where gravity was gone; I wandered through the silence of your gaze And somehow lost the person I was on. My heartbeat stumbled, then forgot its name, It ran barefoot through corridors of light; I blushed as though the moon had called me beautiful, Then hid my face from heaven's watching sight. The trees leaned closer, jealous of the view, The flowers opened wider just to see; Even the wind became unusually shy, As thoug...
Look at yourself.
Not the face
the mirror has been rehearsing for years,
but the one hiding
under your skin.
Look closely.
There is a small door
behind your left eye.
You have never opened it.
Inside,
an old version of you
is sitting at a table
made from yesterday,
turning pages with hands
that have forgotten their own shape.
Open the pages.
Do not ask
who wrote them.
Some words were written by storms.
Some by strangers.
Some by nights
that refused to become mornings.
And some,
some were written by you
while you were asleep.
Turn the page.
A black sun is hanging
from the ceiling.
It has no heat,
only memories.
Underneath it,
your forgotten dreams
are growing teeth.
They are waiting
for you to remember their names.
Turn another page.
There is a road
running through your childhood.
It has no beginning.
It has no end.
Only footprints.
You follow them
until they suddenly become yours.
Then you realize
you have been walking backward
your entire life.
Look at yourself.
The book is breathing now.
Its pages rise and fall
like a sleeping animal.
Something underneath the paper
is knocking.
Once.
Twice.
Again.
You place your hand
against the page.
It knocks back.
Open it.
There you are.
Not who you became.
Not who they wanted.
Not who you pretended to be
when the world was watching.
Just you,
standing barefoot
in the middle of a sentence
that has not learned how to end.
Do not close the book.
Let the strange things remain strange.
Let the moon keep swimming
through the margins.
Let the dead flowers
remember how to bloom.
Let the shadows
carry their own names.
And if you find a page
with nothing written on it,
do not call it empty.
Perhaps the page
is waiting for a version of you
that has not been born yet.
Perhaps tomorrow
is hiding there.
Perhaps you are.
So look at yourself.
Open the pages.
Keep turning
until the book forgets
where the old you ended,
and begins writing
without asking permission.
© 2026 Gloria Penelope
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