Cartography

Someone has been redrawing
the geography of my mind.

Roads that once led home
now end
at cliffs.

Every bridge
wears the same handwritten sign.

Unsafe.

The forests have grown differently.

They no longer shelter birds.

Only echoes.

Only branches
that resemble reaching hands
if I look at them
after midnight.

There is a coastline
I cannot explain.

Each morning
the sea retreats a little farther,

taking with it

a name,

a certainty,

the version of myself

who believed
arrival
was inevitable.

I have searched
for the country
I remember becoming.

Its houses
still appear in dreams,

their windows warm,

their doors unlocked,

their light
unafraid of darkness.

But every compass
I carry

spins

whenever I get close.

Perhaps anxiety

is not a monster.

Perhaps

it is a cartographer.

Patient.

Meticulous.

It never burns the world.

It simply redraws it

until every horizon
looks like a warning.

Still,

there are mistakes
even careful mapmakers make.

Yesterday,

I laughed

before remembering
I was supposed to be afraid.

A flower
grew through concrete

without consulting
the blueprint.

Rain

crossed every border
that fear had carefully inked.

Tonight

I will unfold
my own map.

Untidy.

Coffee-stained.

Incomplete.

I will leave blank spaces

where certainty demands
a conclusion.

After all,

every explorer
has mistaken

an ocean

for the edge
of the earth.