Atlas of Small Lights

I draw a map of the kitchen at midnight— our kettle a harbor, the clock a low tide, the moths stitching white commas into the dark. Outside, the street is a long held breath.

The city learns its constellations from us: phone screens in windows, a patient porch bulb, a bus kneeling at the curb like a prayer no one says aloud but everyone hears.

Somewhere a name cools on a sill of rain, a letter not sent, still warm in the hand. I fold it into the atlas of small lights, where each remembered glow has its own latitude.

Morning arrives without fanfare, a thin gold thread. We hang it across the room and call it weather. The map lifts, flutters, finds the open window— not a farewell, just a route we hadn't walked.