Instructions

He tells me not to cross my legs

So I sit as one might sit

Watching

Not interfering too quickly

My legs

So used to folding like branches seeking each other

Now rest apart

Two quiet limbs learning distance

They say a narrowing

I imagine it as a path in the woods

Grown thin with seasons

A place where light enters more carefully

Where even the smallest step must be placed with intention

There is a restlessness in me

Not loud, but persistent

Like wind moving through tall grass just out of sight

My body remembers
what it once did without asking

It leans toward itself,
tries to close, to return to the comfort of its own shape

And I stop it, gently now

Not with force
Just a quiet redirection

In this small act I begin to notice more

The weight of my own presence

The way I occupy space

The subtle shifting
of balance and breath

And then something softer embraces me

Feels like dusk settling over a field

Like water finding its level

A knowing that

I do not have to hold all of this by effort alone

I imagine being carried the way the earth carries root

The way the river carries stone

Not by removing them

But making room
for their passage

So I sit

In this small

Altered posture

As if my body itself
were a landscape

Asking me to walk it