When Weight Becomes Wings [a poem]

In the beginning, it was only burden—
stone laid upon stone,
its shadow descending into the hollow of your shoulders,
pressing the hours into a slow and heavy hush.

You did not summon it,
yet it came, unbidden,
and you, without complaint or flourish,
took it upon your frame—
step by unnumbered step,
through the measureless corridors of days.