Alexandra Konstanti

If you listen to the ice creaking as it melts beneath running water
if you hear its hushed crack as it shifts its shape
if you feel the ground give by a millimeter, stepping into yesterday’s rain-soaked mud
if you imagine what a woman’s bag might do, hanging from a traffic light
if you cry as crowds move past you, and you still count yourself alone in the world
if you rise a little higher, pretending transcendence, to watch yourself hurting, hurting
if a shared memory pins you down, and you stick yourself on the fridge like a magnet, one with the city on it
if you wonder whether birds’ small feet freeze on the frozen lake
if you become the story of a gray building
if you let your heart split open and watch it quietly take pleasure in it, knowing this is what it is made for
if you step aside and carry someone else’s loneliness, and your guilt for not being there
if you can hold the whole world’s breath, its smell, its color
if you send a message and hear your own voice inside the words
if you hear your truth and your lie at the same time
if you grow tired

then,
then will you have lived?

Copenhagen, 1/1/2026