I stand at the bank,
my face rippling
into twelve faces.
One belongs to the child
who slept beside monsters.
Another, the man
who buried his laughter in silence.
One is nothing but water
turning into sky.
The river tells me:
you are never whole—
only a congregation of ghosts
that refuse to drown.
Still, I drink:
every fractured reflection,
every mouth that is mine,
until the taste returns—
salt, blood,
myself.