Zebra Seeking Spoons

Some days don’t begin—

they collapse.

Morning comes in pieces,

like a dropped plate I don’t have the strength to gather.

Light feels loud.

Even breathing has edges.

I reach for my spoons

and find only the memory of them—

a drawer that echoes when opened,

metal ghosts clinking against nothing.

Today is a crash day.

My body pulls the emergency brake

without asking where I needed to go.

Plans scatter like startled birds,

lifting away from me

one by one.

Shower? Too far.

Food? Too much.

Words? Heavy in my mouth,

as if each one costs more than I can afford.

I lie still,

not resting—

just existing in the aftermath

of a system overload.

Even my thoughts move slowly,

wading through syrup,

trying to remind me

that this is temporary

even when it doesn’t feel like it.

Outside, the world keeps spending energy

like it’s infinite—

footsteps, laughter, engines, lives unfolding—

and I am here

learning how to survive on empty.

No spoons.

Not even one.

Only this:

a quiet kind of endurance,

a soft refusal to disappear,

a body doing its best

in a language made of pain.

And maybe—

if I am gentle enough with myself,

if I loosen my grip on what today “should” have been—

this can still count.

A day not lived,

but carried.