A Quiet Weight

it’s the hum of the fridge at 3 a.m., the distant bark of a dog you’ll never meet, the streetlight spilling its orange glow onto a sidewalk that leads nowhere in particular. you exist but not in the way a tree exists— rooted, purposeful, reaching always upward. you’re the leaf that forgot how to hold on. the universe doesn’t ask why you’re here; it just spins, indifferent, while you stand at the edge of the sink, watching water drip and wondering if that’s all there is— the falling, the landing, the waiting for another drop. some days, you think you feel it— the connection, the spark. you buy bread, you hold a door open, you laugh at something stupid on TV. but it slips away like sand through a fist you didn’t mean to clench. and maybe that’s the point: to hold nothing, to sit with the weight of everything, to stare into the fridge light and see only what’s missing.