I Am Not Immortal Any More

I used to think I was made of saltwater and wire, the bones humming with the permanence of myth. I stood naked in the mirror— a girl with the face of her mother, but none of her death in her yet. I thought I could outlast sorrow, that heartbreak would crack and pour out of me like yolk without taking the shell. But now, when I kneel at the side of the bed to pick up the sock you dropped, my spine sighs like an old house— I feel time like a breath behind me. Even my blood knows it. The nights stretch longer, my dreams more quiet. I wake, and do not expect a miracle.