You stood in front of the shiny wall again this morning, and I felt the whole survey run: chin lifted, then dropped, weight shifting to the left foot, right hand rising to press flat against the stomach, the small breath held while you looked. I don't know what you were looking for.
I only know your shoulders climbed a half inch toward your ears and stayed there, and I carried them like that through the coffee, the emails, the whole long grind of the afternoon, waiting for you to remember to put them down.
You leaned in close. The jaw went tight, the way it does. You were reading something in that flat pane that I have no access to, some verdict I cannot feel, because from in here there is no such thing as too much or wrong. There is only the warm hum of the blood doing its rounds, the lungs opening and closing, faithful, the heart keeping its steady four-count under everything you were quietly deciding about us.
I wish you could feel yourself the way I do: from the inside, where you are just a long warm effort that has never once quit. Where the hands that gripped the sink are the same hands that have carried every heavy thing you ever loved. That reflection cannot feel the pulse in the wrist. I can. It's strong. It's been strong all day, no matter what the glass told you.
Tonight, before you sleep, put a hand flat over the chest and just leave it there a moment. Let the shoulders come down. Not to check anything.
Only so I know you felt me still working, still here, still glad it's you I carry.