The Salt of Returning

There is a specific grit to the air when you return to a place that once held your younger skin. It tastes like damp wool and the metallic tang of a coming rain, a flavor that sits at the back of the throat long after the wind has died down. My fingers remember the rough texture of stone walls, the way the moss feels like cold, velvet lungs breathing against the masonry. We think we move forward, but the body is a compass that constantly pulls toward the magnetic north of our own history. It is not a mental map; it is the ache in the knees from a path once walked, the phantom warmth of a sun that set years ago. We are always folding our past into the present, layering the scent of wet earth over the sterile smell of the now. If you stand still enough, can you feel the ghost of your own footsteps beneath your current soles?