No Return Address

i wrote you
this letter
not to return.
but to remind you
i was here.

i loved you
so quietly
i forgot
how to say my own name
out loud.

revolution
does not knock.
it slips
quietly
out the back door
with a bag full of
nothing
but its own name.

sometimes
freedom
is not a scream.
sometimes
it is
the softness
of finally
closing the door.

what if goodbye
was the most radical thing
you ever said?

i stayed
too long
in the fire
to prove
i wasn’t burning.

i kissed the past
with open palms
and walked backward
into my body.

this is not
an apology.

this is not
a warning.

this
is the poem
i finally
wrote
to myself.