Within me
(one)
are many.
I stand before
a hall of dreams—
experiences arranged
like exhibits:
fair trades,
unbalanced ones,
who I was
and who I could not be.
I sit in the gallery
of my own imagining,
hovering above
movement and stagnation,
searching for pattern.
Logic keeps me safe
while everything mingles.
The projector clicks.
Slow at first.
Then steady—
like a train pulling memory
down its track.
Flicker.
Light.
I am lulled.
I understand the staying
and the leaving,
the cleaving,
the fall.
Shadows drip
between choice
and consequence—
wax from a tongue
that once burned
with lies.
Faces I trusted
tilt in the light.
Spies in their eyes.
Or was it mine
that misread?
I thought I knew.
At least
I trusted.
I replay.
Hover above.
Detached.
Objective.
What questions
should I have asked?
The kiss.
It split me.
Once one—
now two.
I built a case
for future disgrace,
called it truth,
called it depth,
called it destiny.
But you only tilted me—
then let me go.
What I named vast
was narrow.
What I called deep
was small.
The descent—
mine.
I wanted you
to speak truth.
Instead
I heard
what I wanted.
Weak.
Yes.
Deceived—
by myself.
Within me
(one)
are many—
but now
one fewer.
I lay the hall down.
Let the projector darken.
Offer illusion
back to silence.
And keep
what is real.
© Jill Szoo Wilson
Jill Szoo Wilson 