Heliotrope

In this city of concrete and unforgiving angles, she moves against the grain of the world's design. Each step up the rough-hewn staircase is a deliberate act, a flight from the deep shadows that pool at her feet. She reaches for the railing not for support, but as a tether to the present moment, her gaze already fixed on the blue expanse above the overpass. The hard noon sun bleaches the world to its essential forms, casting a stark twin of her own making against the wall. This shadow-self remains below, unable to follow her ascent toward a truth found only in the light. She is a study in vectors, a living diagonal aimed at a future just beyond the frame.