Measuring Heat

Glass tube pressed against skin,

a fragile line of red crawling steady,

silent witness to what I can’t say.

The room hums low and dim,

the mercury climbs slow and sure,

a ruler of fevered breaths and whispered chills.

This slender glass holds the weight

of something inside me rising,

a quiet betrayal in each degree.

I watch the red inch forward—

a scarlet thread unraveling heat,

the small proof that my body carries

its own secret storms.