Fragments of Cassandra

How do I tell a stranger, 
when they smile 
and softly question,

"How have you been?"

How do I answer 
without unraveling the funeral 
I've carried beneath my chest?

For I am nowhere.

Suspended 
in a quantum purgatory-
where yesterday has learned to rot, 
yet tomorrow 
has forgotten me.

The soul I once inhabited 
has long been laid to rest;
but the ghost 
of who I'm meant to be 
has not yet drawn its breath.

So if I seem like silence 
wearing skin-
forgive me.

I am simply haunting the space 
between an ending 
and a beginning.


Be'ahava,
The Mourning Bird