Instructions for Avoiding Relief

Begin by postponing the obvious.

If something has ended, do not mark it.

Leave the door as it was.

Do not close it.

Do not stand in it either.

Breathe, but shallowly.

Enough to function.

Not enough to settle.

When the body suggests release

(a sigh, a softening, a sentence that feels final),

interrupt it with inventory.

Name what is unfinished.

There is always something.

Keep your hands busy.

Fold paper.

Reorder files.

Wash the same cup twice.

Repetition delays arrival.

If relief approaches anyway,

it will feel like lightness,

or silence expanding behind the ribs.

Counter this by remembering sequence.

What happened first.

Then what followed.

Then what never corrected itself.

Do not blame.

Blame is too clean.

Instead, catalogue variables.

Weather. Timing. Minor choices.

The angle of a sentence spoken too late.

Sleep helps relief.

Therefore, reduce sleep.

Lie down, but think structurally.

What holds.

What bears weight.

What would fail if loosened.

Should relief still appear,

brief and uninvited,

acknowledge it without agreement.

Say nothing.

Let it pass through

without being housed.

End by doing nothing definitive.

No conclusion.

No gesture that implies safety.

Relief cannot stay

where nothing has been cleared for it.