Not trophies, I repeat, not trophies—anchors,
stones I thread to keep the river slow.
Each bead a cooled eclipse of former thunder,
each bead a name I only let me know.

I touch them when the rafters start to creak,
when night rehearses knives against my throat,
when rudeness in the world unbuttons manners
and something feral asks me for a vote.

Memory is discipline. I count in crimson,
press cold against fever in my hand.
If balance is a metronome of breathing,
these beads are weights that steady what I am.

I do not plead with gods. I polish edges.
I starve the howl with sterner kinds of bread.
Yet sometimes in the window’s black reflection
I see gallery flicker, petaled red.

Then morning fits its white coat on my shoulders.
I tuck the bracelet where the pulse runs thin.
Not trophies, no—just anchors I can carry,
to keep the darker weather from within.