The Last Bite Knows My Name

It begins with wonder
a plate appearing like a tiny universe,
steam curling upward
as if it remembers the sky.
Colors speak before I do,
golden edges,
a quiet gloss of oil,
herbs scattered like constellations
I don’t yet understand.

I lean in.
The air tastes alive.

First bite,
joy breaks open.

It is laughter without sound,
heat blooming across my tongue,
sweet meeting salt
like two strangers
who were always meant to find each other.
I close my eyes,
not to escape,
but to stay.

Every flavor becomes a voice:
garlic, low and certain;
pepper, quick and bright;
something soft and slow
wrapping the moment in warmth.
I forget time.
I forget the world beyond the plate.
There is only this,
this fullness
that feels like being understood.

I eat
and the joy grows louder.

Faster now,
because happiness,
when it is real,
makes you greedy.

Fork to mouth,
again,
again,
a rhythm of wanting
that feels like living.

But wonder shifts.

The plate is changing,
spaces opening
where something used to be.
Sauce thinning
into streaks of memory.
The edges showing themselves
like truths I tried not to see.

I slow down.

Pain arrives quietly,
not in the taste,
but in the noticing.

There is less.

Less warmth,
less color,
less of the thing
that made the world feel whole
just moments ago.

I take another bite,
and it feels heavier now,
not because it weighs more,
but because it matters more.

The last bite waits.

Small.
Too small
for everything it carries.

I hold it there,
hovering,
a fragile ending
that refuses to pretend
it isn’t one.

Joy says, eat it.
Pain says, don’t.
Wonder just watches.

So I do.

And suddenly,
nothing.

The plate is empty,
a quiet circle
that no longer answers me.
The warmth fades
like a voice walking away.
Even the air feels thinner.

I sit with it,
this absence that tastes like before,
this silence that remembers sound.

Strange,
how something so beautiful
teaches you loss
the moment it ends.

Strange,
how the mouth keeps reaching
for what is no longer there.

And still,
wonder does not leave.

It lingers
in the aftertaste,
in the echo of flavor
that refuses to disappear completely,
in the question blooming softly:

Was it the dish,
or the moment,
that I am missing?

Because even now,
even with nothing left,
something inside me
is already searching.

Not just for food,
but for that first spark again,
that sudden joy,
that fleeting fullness
that hurt
only because it was real.

And I understand, finally,

Hunger
is not emptiness.

It is memory

learning how to hope again.