We start with this mantra: I am absolved when I face my fears. So look into the mirror and decipher the messages on my skin—these scars from where I unearth secrets beyond words are also the burial sites of my past selves. A lesson learned, sometimes self-inflicted by my own naivety. What we share is this look of shame and guilt showing not on our faces but in our speech. Sound becomes smoke in an instant we choose to lie, where that smoke is a semblance of life we choose to deny in exchange for a mask, to hide the desire of disappearing in a moment of sudden exposure.

I am free when I embrace the earthquakes coming from this body.

Kael Espino (@enjambments) x Midjourney, 2022