Roadside stones…

I

Click…

Even in rubber sandals
the earth speaks a language of teeth and bone.
Pebbles bite back.
The road pulses like a held breath,
slick with yesterday’s shadows,
and you—light as a sparrow’s guess,
step where silence has been planted.

II

You are small,
yet the road remembers you.
Its dust has tasted your palms,
the weeds you pulled like soft lies for your mother,
their green throats collapsing in dry bottles,
time learning how to wilt.

III

Under a roof stitched from mud and hope

you folded yourself inward,
knees to ribs, ribs to prayer,
sleeping like a seed waiting for mercy.
Night pressed your eyes open,
no stars, only the ache of imagining another life
just beyond the dark.

IV

Morning does not ask permission.
The sun lifts like a blade of copper.

All but hidden behind lsst night’s lingering flames
Wind skims sand across your foot as if brushing off a footprint
meant to remain forever.
Around you, nothing moves except the understanding
arriving too late,
the sound the second click never needed to make.

V

You try to smile as you lift your head skyward…,
that other place must be safer,
you think, lifting your eyes further from what has claimed you.
Your brother’s grin flashes,
a rough wooden queen sliding,
a checkmate victory frozen mid‑laugh.

You close your eyes.

Click...
If only the last move
could be taken back.