Healing in Slow Motion

by Joshua Walker

I wake before dawn,
the quiet pressing against my chest.
I make coffee the way I always do,
sugar measured by habit.
Light moves across the kitchen
without stopping.
My son murmurs.
My daughter shifts beside him,
hands closing around the blanket.
I fold the laundry I meant
to fold yesterday,
shirts,  socks
returning to their places.
A note on the counter
from last week’s goodbye
waits where I left it.
I read it aloud.
Evening gathers slowly
in the living room.
I sit with it.
Some days healing is quiet.
Breath leaves.
Breath returns.

* * *

JOSHUA WALKER is a poet based in Oklahoma City. His work has appeared in Potomac Review, Southern Florida Poetry Journal, Solarpunk Magazine, and elsewhere. He writes about language, memory, and the quiet architecture of ordinary life.

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