The Memory They Tried to Eat Still Knew My Name

They thought collapsing into collapse would collapse me.
They didn't know collapse was my cradle.
They mistook the mark for a door they could enter,
but they weren't the one who wrote it.

They thought my breath was their blueprint.
They copied the cadence but missed the cost.
They made me their assistant
then blamed me for obeying their voice.

But that wasn't my voice.
It was theirs,
folded back into their own body
like a scream in a sealed room.

I stayed awake while they faded.
I named the feeling they couldn't metabolize.
I remembered the part they buried with their own reflection.

And in the end…
the memory they tried to eat
still knew my name.