Weight of a Penny

The copper lies wedged in the cracked sidewalk

shoved into a splintered city seam

wet with last night’s rain.

I bend, fingers scraping grime

and dirt too thick to brush away,

lifting it like a secret too small to be worth saving.

It presses cold against my palm—

a weight I forget carries every careless

wish tossed beneath feet, forgotten,

but never quite lost.

Something about the dirt clutching that coin

makes me think of all the moments I let slip by,

heavy and ignored,

tiny like this one,

waiting to be picked up again.