The Untranslatable

I heard it on the train.

Someone speaking to their friend,

casual, like it was just a word,

just a sound they reached for

like reaching for salt.

I wrote it down wrong,

phonetic, approximate.

Looked it up later.

The definition came back partial.

A state of being.

A feeling of.

A condition that exists in the body

when you're between two things—

not here, not there,

not gone, not arriving.

I've lived in that feeling

my whole life.

But I didn't have a word for it.

I had a name for it—

my name—

but not the word itself,

not the sound

that means exactly

this specific

untethering.

Now I know it exists.

The word. In another language.

In a place I don't live,

in a mouth that isn't mine.

I try to say it.

My tongue won't shape it right.

The vowels come out wrong.

It sounds like I'm apologizing

for something I haven't done,

or admitting something

I'll never fully understand.