It’s been a month since I saw you last.

Our lives are ruled by agendas, measured by calendars, hustled by the ever-slowing ticks of the minute hand. It’s a matching game where no card has a partner, each wore slip fluttering to the ground from the stacked deck. If only we could spin free, golden days from sack-cloth and straw like modern Rumplestiltskins.

tell me, are we doomed

to only be cracked mirrors

of our parents’ fate?