The quiet part of me

I wish I could say it.

All the wordsI kept buried inside.

The feelings I hid5behind a smile,

the tears I swallowedwhen nobody was looking.

People say,

"Just open your heart."

10But what if my heartdoesn't know how to speak?

What if every timeI try to explain,

my voice disappears15before the words arrive?

I never wantedto seem distant.

I never wantedto push you away.

20I just didn't knowhow to ask for comfort

without feeling likea burden.

So I learned to smile.

25I learned to say,

"I'm fine."

I learned to hidethe storms inside me.

But sometimes,

30I wish someone would notice—

not the smile,

not the mask,

but the quiet part of methat is begging to be understood.

35I don't need youto fix everything.

I don't need perfect words.

I only want someoneto sit beside me

40and say,

"I know you're hurting.

You don't have to hide anymore."

Because even a silent heart

is still a heart.

45And even the quietest soul

still wishes

to be heard.

The sky looks beautiful today,

but I know better.

Some stormsdo not come with thunder.

5Some stormslive quietly inside the heart.

I keep searchingfor the right words,

but every feeling10turns into silencebefore it reaches my lips.

I want to say,

"I'm tired."

I want to say,

15"I need someone."

But my voice disappears,

and I become someonewho smiles through the rain.

People see the calm.

20They never seethe waves crashing underneath.

They never hearthe questions I ask myselfwhen the night becomes too long.

25Am I too much?

Am I not enough?

Why does wanting to be understoodfeel like asking for the impossible?

I keep giving pieces of myself30until there is almost nothing left.

And still,

I say,

"I'm okay."

Maybe I'm just a cloud35holding too much water,

waiting for the momentI can finally let it fall.

So if one dayyou see my tears,

40please don't ask mewhy I am crying.

Just stay.

Because sometimes,

a heart doesn't need answers.

45It only needs someonewho won't leavewhen the rain begins.

I'm tired.

Not of the world,

but of the noise it creates.

The voices that judge5without knowing the story.

The words thrown like weaponsfrom people who never learnedhow much they can hurt.

They speak so easily.

10They break so casually.

Then they walk awayas if nothing happened.

But I remember.

I remember every scar15left by careless words.

Every momentI had to pretendI wasn't affected.

They tell me to ignore it.

20They tell me to stay calm.

But how do you stay silentwhen your heart is screaming?

How do you smilewhen anger burns25under your skin?

Sometimes I want to shout.

Sometimes I want the whole worldto feel the weightof what they caused.

30But I know—

anger is a fire.

It can warm you,

or it can consume you.

So I'll turn my frustration35into strength.

I'll let my voice become louderthan their hatred.

I'll keep walking forward,

not because it didn't hurt,

40but because I refuseto let their words

become my ending.

There goes the lonely boy,smiling just enoughto convince the worldhe's doing fine.

5No one noticeshow heavy silence becomeswhen the room empties,or how every laughis followed10by another sleepless night.

He carries stormsbehind gentle eyes,

and every"I'm okay"15is another liehe's learnedto tell so well.

He watches peoplefind a place20to call homein someone else's heart,while he keeps wonderingwhat it feels liketo be chosen.

25To be someone'sfirst thought.

Someone's safe place.

Someone's reasonto stay.

30He isn't askingfor the whole world.

Just one personwho will noticewhen his smile fades,35who will hold his handwithout letting go,who will look at himand say,

"You don't have to40carry everything alone."

Until then,

he'll keep walking,

a lonely boywith a heart45still brave enoughto believe

that one day,

someone will call it

home.

Somewhere between the galaxies,

there is a little heart

floating alone.

Not lost,

5just searching

for a place

where it can finally rest.

The universe is so wide,

yet loneliness

10can still feel

like the smallest room.

I chase after stars

that disappear by morning.

I hold onto dreams

15that slip through my paws.

I wonder if the moon

ever feels lonely too,

watching everyone leave

while it stays behind.

20Maybe I'm just a small creature

in an endless sky,

trying to understand

why I feel everything

so deeply.

25But even in the darkest ocean

of endless space,

there is still a light

waiting to be found.

A gentle voice.

30A warm hand.

A place that says,

"You don't have to wander anymore."

So I'll keep swimming

through this universe,

35through the storms,

through the silence,

until I find my little corner

among the stars.

And when I look back,

40I'll know—

I was never drowning.

I was only learning

how to find my way home.

I learned to wear my silencelike armor beneath my skin,to smile as though nothing hurtwhile the war inside continued.

5Nobody taught me how to fall apart.They only taught me how to stand,how to wipe the tears before they fell,how to make a trembling heartlook steady in my hands.

10So I became my own battlefield,my own enemy, my own retreat.Some nights, I hated every weaknessthat made me feel too much,too deeply,15too honestly.

I blamed myself for every ending,replayed every word until it bled,searched for something wrong with mein every silence someone left behind.

20As if being abandonedmeant I was never worth staying for.As if being hurtmeant I deserved the pain.

But I'm tired of standing trial25for every wound I didn't understand.Tired of punishing the girl in the mirrorfor doing the best she couldwith a heart she never learned to protect.

There are things about me30I still struggle to forgive.Fears I haven't conquered,old thoughts that still return,memories that know exactlywhere to find me in the dark.

35I won't call myself healedjust because I learned to hide it better.

I am still becoming.Still unlearning the instinctto call myself unworthy40whenever someone chooses to leave.

And maybe the hardest fightisn't convincing the world I'm strong.Maybe it's looking at my reflectionand refusing to become cruel45to the person who has suffered the most.

Me.

I have survived daysI never knew how to explain,carried grief without a name,50and begged for peacein a language only my heart understood.

Yet here I stand—not untouched,not fearless,55not some beautiful storyabout turning pain into gold.

Just human.

A woman with cracks in her courage,with anger she is learning to hold,60with love that sometimes costs too much,and a future she hasn't met yet.

I will not erase my pastto prove I've changed.I will not pretend the darkness65never knew my name.

It knew me.It hurt me.Sometimes, I let it speak for me.

But it doesn't get to write70every page that comes after.

I am more than the worst thoughtI've ever believed about myself.More than the nights I couldn't cope.More than the people I couldn't keep.

75I don't need to win every battleto deserve a gentler life.

So let the scars remain.Let the truth be imperfect.Let the world see a woman80who is still learning how to livewithout turning against herself.

I have spent enough yearstrying to prove I am worth loving.

Now I want to learn85how to stand beside myselfeven when nobody else does.

And if tomorrow finds mestill fighting the same old war,I will meet myself without hatred.

90Not because I have conquered everything,but because, after all this time,I am finally learningthat I was never my enemy.

I was the one95who needed me most.

One step closer.One step closer.

Then I lost.

Ah, I wasn't okay.5I'm not okay.

But it's life, soI swallow it.

Again.Again.

10Until there's nothing left to swallow,until the silence fills my chest,until I can't tellif my heart is healingor simply giving up on being heard.

15Hey,why are you doing this?

Why do you keep smilingwhen everything inside youis begging you to stop?

20Why do you keep saying"It's fine,"when you know it isn't?

Why do you keep swallowingthe words that might save you25from drowning in your own silence?

...

Because it's easier.

Easier than explaining.Easier than being misunderstood.30Easier than watching someone's face changewhen they realize you're not as okayas you pretended to be.

Easier to say nothingthan to explain the storm35to someone who only cameto ask about the weather.

So I swallow it.

The disappointment.The exhaustion.40The little pieces of myselfI keep losingjust to make it through another day.

Again.Again.

45Until my throat forgetswhat it feels like to speak,until my eyes grow tiredof holding back the rain.

And somewhere inside me,50a small voice still asks:

How much of yourselfare you going to burybefore you realizeyou're the one left underground?

55I have no answer.

Only another breath.Another morning.Another stepI don't quite know how to take.

60One step closer.One step closer.

I don't know where I'm going.

I only knowI'm tired of pretending65that getting through itmeans I'm okay.

And maybe, just maybe,the first thing I need to stop swallowingis the truth.

70I'm not okay.

I haven't been okay.

And I'm tiredof making that soundlike it's nothing.

75Because it's easier.

But easierdoesn't mean it doesn't hurt.

I have learned to cry quietly,to let the darkness hold my facewhen the world expects me to wakeas though nothing has changed.

5There are storms beneath my skinthat no one hears arriving,thunder trapped behind my ribs,a thousand words swallowed by silence.

I wonder if anyone would notice10how tired my eyes have become,how my laughter sometimes arrivesjust to keep the questions away.

I have been the shoulder,the shelter,15the one who stayswhen someone else is falling apart.

But when the night finds me trembling,where do I put the piecesI have spent so long hiding20so nobody else has to see them?

I tell myself to be stronger,as if strength means never breaking,as if a heart can bleed in secretand still be asked to beat normally.

25Some days, I am nothingbut a girl beneath her blankets,trying to convince herselfthat tomorrow is worth meeting.

And yet, somewhere inside me,30beneath the ache and exhaustion,a small, stubborn light refusesto surrender its place to the dark.

It doesn't shine beautifully.It doesn't promise me a happy ending.35Sometimes, it is only the smallest breath,the decision to stay for one more moment.

But perhaps that is enough.

Perhaps I was never meantto be unbreakable.40Perhaps I am allowed to bea thousand shattered thingsand still be someone worth saving.

I am more than the love I gave,more than the goodbyes I couldn't prevent,45more than the nights I begged the universeto return what I wasn't ready to lose.

I am the girl who kept feelingeven when feeling became unbearable.The girl who gave warmth50while quietly freezing herself.

And I am learning, slowly,that my pain deserves a voice,that my tears are not a weakness,that I don't have to disappear55to prove how deeply I have loved.

Let the world be loud.Let my sorrow shake the wallsof every room I have hidden in.

I will not apologize60for the weight of my heart.

One day, I hope to look in the mirrorand see more than the girl who survived.I hope to see the girl who returnedto herself, piece by piece,65without having to become someone else.

Until then,if all I can do is breathethrough another quiet night,I will count that as courage.

70Even when nobody hears me,even when I cannot explain the storm,even when my tears fall softerthan the world can everunderstand—

75I am still here.

And perhaps, for now,that is the loudest thingabout me.

Beneath a moon that forgot to shine,I stitched my sorrow into lace,wore midnight blue instead of white,and hid my tears behind my face.

5The world above kept turning on,its windows warm, its gardens bright.While I became a ghost of myself,a bride who danced alone at night.

My bones remembered every fall,10my heart recalled what hurt the most.I learned to smile with hollow eyes,a living girl who felt like a ghost.

The dead would whisper, Come and rest.The shadows offered me a place.15They promised I could cease to feel,that I could leave without a trace.

But something stirred beneath the dust,a little spark that would not die.A stubborn pulse, a quiet truth,20a wish to see another sky.

I had mistaken pain for fate,believed my sorrow was my name.I wore my wounds like wedding ringsand thought that hurt was all I came to claim.

25But I was never born to hauntthe rooms where yesterday still sleeps.I was not made to guard my griefor bury every dream I keep.

So I unpinned my veil of blue,30let all the wilted ribbons fall.I faced the girl beneath the laceand saw she wasn't lost at all.

She was exhausted. She was afraid.She'd carried more than she could say.35She needed someone to hold her hand—and I could start with mine today.

No prince arrived to break the spell.No perfect love unlocked the door.I chose to take one step toward life,40then found the strength to take one more.

Let the moonlight touch my skin.Let morning find me where I stand.I am no ghost of what has been.I am still here. I still have plans.

45And if my dress remains midnight blue,if grief still trails behind my feet,I'll wear it as a part of me,not as a shroud, but as something I survived.

I was the bride who mourned the dead,50who thought her story had to end.

But underneath the veil, I founda life that hadn't started yet.

Lately, I have been feeling like a ghostin a house that still belongs to me.

The rooms are familiar,the portraits still hang crooked on the walls,5and the clock continues its endless ticking—yet somehow,everything feels as though it belongsto a life I can no longer touch.

I wander through my days10in a dress of faded midnight blue,my sleeves stitched with silence,my pockets full of thingsI no longer know how to name.

There is a ballroom inside my chest.

15Once, its chandeliers burned brightly.Music wandered through its corridors,and every window held a little promiseof what tomorrow might bring.

Now the candles flicker.20The orchestra has forgotten its song.Dust settles upon the floorwhere my younger self once dancedwithout wondering whether she deserved the music.

Sometimes, I stand at the entrance25and wait for something to happen.

A knock upon the door.A sudden warmth beneath my ribs.A reason to lift my headand look beyond the endless blue.

30But nothing comes.

Only the wind,dragging its cold fingersthrough the cracks in the windows.

And I wonder—

35Is this what emptiness looks likewhen it has lived inside you too long?

Not a terrible darkness,not a storm that tears the roof away,but a quiet, abandoned place40where even sadness has grown tiredof keeping you company.

I have become familiar with the silence.

I know which floorboards creak.I know which corners collect the shadows.45I know how to smile at the portraitsso nobody asks why the girl in the mirrorlooks a little less alive each day.

Yet somewhere beneath my ribs,a small blue butterfly still stirs.

50Its wings are delicate,its flight uncertain,and sometimes it rests so quietlythat I mistake it for something dead.

But it moves.

55And perhaps that is whyI have not locked every door.

Perhaps some part of me still wonderswhat lies beyond this house,beyond the crooked portraits60and the ballroom without music.

I want to see the world again.

Not as the girl I was before,not as some perfect bridewith an unbroken heart and spotless lace,65but as the woman who can walkthrough a graveyard of old feelingswithout mistaking every tombstonefor a place she must remain.

I want to open the curtains.70Let the moonlight find the dust.Let the cold air touch my facewithout believing I must become cold, too.

I want to rememberthat a quiet heart is not always a dead one,75that a lonely room can be entered again,that even a forgotten ballroommight someday hold music.

For now,I will leave one candle burning.

80Not because I know who will come,or because I am waiting for someoneto rescue me from this place.

But because I want to find my own waythrough the dark.

85And if the girl in the mirrorstill wears her midnight-blue veil,if her eyes still carry the weightof a thousand unspoken things,I will not call her broken.

90I will take her hand.

We will walk through the empty ballroomone slow step at a time,past the wilted roses,past the dust-covered mirrors,95past every version of ourselveswe thought we had lost forever.

We may not dance tonight.

We may not even know the melody.

But the candle is still burning,100the butterfly is still breathing,and somewhere beyond these walls,the morning is waiting.

I am not home yet.

But perhaps,105for the first time in a long while,I am willing to find the door.

There are things the night knowsthat the morning will never hear,little pieces of yesterdayI keep folded somewhere near.

5I learned to smile through winter,to let the rain fall out of sight,to carry an entire oceanand still insist the shore was fine.

Somewhere along the way,10I became good at being quiet.I could turn a storm into a whisperand convince the world there was no riot.

I kept the broken pieces,not because I liked the pain,15but because I feared that letting gowould mean losing what remained.

And so I walked with heavy pockets,full of words I never said,while a thousand little questions20made their home inside my head.

I wonder if the stars grow tiredof watching the same moon fade,if the sky remembers every wishthat someone was too afraid to say.

25Perhaps growing up is learningthat not every wound needs a name,that some things change us quietlyand leave us different all the same.

Still, somewhere beneath the silence,30a softer song survives—not loud enough to stop the thunder,but enough to prove something insidehasn't entirely gone quiet.

So if the night finds me wandering,35let it think I'm chasing dreams.Some things are easier left unspokenthan explained by what they seem.

And when the morning finds me,I will gather what is mine,40leave a little room for healing,and let the rest fall out of time.

No grand goodbye,no promise carved in stone—just a heart learning, little by little,45how to make a homeof its own.

Some things disappear with time,like footprints washed away by rain,while others settle beneath the skin,too deep to ever look the same.

5The seasons change, the flowers fade,the moon forgets its former light,yet certain echoes never leave,they only learn to hide from sight.

Perhaps that's how the past survives—10not as a wound, nor as a scar,but as a quiet little achethat follows you from near to far.

And even when the world moves on,when old chapters close their eyes,15some things remain without a name,like fading stars in distant skies.

No one can see what time has left,or count the things we keep inside.Some stories end upon the page,20but leave their ink beneath the skin.

I wonder what the stars would sayif they could hear the things unsaid,the little dreams we tucked away,the paths our wandering hearts once led.

5Perhaps the moon knows somethingthat the daylight cannot see,why certain lights stay with uslong after they cease to be.

Somewhere beyond the midnight sky,10there must be worlds we haven't known,where time moves gently, dreams don't die,and no one has to feel alone.

Until I find that distant place,I'll let the quiet hours unfold,15and keep a little piece of wonderfor the things I cannot hold.

For life is wide, the sky is endless,and there are still new stars to find.Yet some small wishes travel with us,20like moonlight lingering behind.

There is a certain kind of longingthat never makes a sound,it simply settles in the quietwhen no one's looking around.

5Like watching windows glow at dusk,each one holding its own light,and wondering what it feels liketo belong somewhere at night.

The seasons change without asking,10the old trees learn to grow anew,yet some little things remain behindlike shadows painted blue.

Perhaps the saddest thing about a wishis how gently it can stay,15even when the hands that held ithave long since turned away.

So I leave mine with the evening,where the stars can keep it small,and pretend I never wanted20anything at all.

Still, when the moon hangs low above meand the world turns soft and dim,I wonder if the things we never findever wonder about us, too.

Some evenings feel unfinished,like a song that fades too soon,like a chair left by the windowbeneath a pale and patient moon.

5The world keeps turning gently,the hours pass like falling rain,yet certain little silencesstill feel strangely familiar again.

I wonder how a place can hold10the shape of something that's not there,how an ordinary momentcan feel heavier with empty air.

Perhaps it's just the quiet,or the way the night turns blue,15how even the smallest thingscan remind us of what once felt true.

I keep moving with the seasons,letting new days come and go,but some wishes have no language,20and some feelings grow in silence, slow.

If the stars could keep a secret,I'd leave one beneath their light:that sometimes, all the heart remembersis how it felt to have someone nearby.

25And when morning finds me waking,I'll let the sunlight fill the room.Still, some spaces stay a little colderlong after the flowers bloom.

She wore the midnight like a veil,with silver dust upon her skin,and kept a thousand silent storieswhere no one else could wander in.

5The roses in her garden withered,the clocks forgot to turn,and every candle in the hallwayheld a little flame she'd learned to earn.

They said she looked like someone dreaming,10a princess sleeping through the years,but no one heard the glass begin to tremblebeneath the weight of unshed tears.

She wasn't waiting for a saviour,nor a hand to pull her through.15She only wished the world would noticeshe was still becoming someone new.

So beneath the crooked chandeliers,she gathered lace and broken things,and stitched herself a pair of wings20from all the silence suffering brings.

Perhaps she was never sleeping.Perhaps she was learning how to rise.For even flowers buried under winterremember spring beneath the ice.

There are days that pass like water,leaving nothing on the shore,just a sky that slowly changesand a silence by the door.

5Beneath the ordinary hours,the tide moves where none can see,carrying little unnamed thingsout toward an endless sea.

Some thoughts become passing weather,10some settle like evening rain.Some find their way into the musicand disappear before the refrain.

When dusk spills blue across the windows,the world seems softer than before.15Even shadows look like somethingthat has wandered in from another shore.

And perhaps the night knows secretsthat the daylight cannot keep—small unfinished constellations20that only stir when the world is asleep.

So let the stars remain distant,let the hours drift like stone.Not every mystery needs a witness,not every seed must yet be shown.

25Some things bloom without announcement,some rivers carve their paths unseen.And somewhere beneath the stillness,something grows where nothing seems.

A quiet figure stood in silver,beneath a sky that wasn't there.She carried fragments of old summersand dust collected from the air.

5Her pockets held forgotten maps,her sleeves were stitched with fading gold.She traced a line across the surfacewhere younger constellations glowed.

Outside, the seasons kept on turning,10the branches learned to bend.Some roads dissolved into the distance,some stories reached an unfamiliar end.

She waited where the light grew thinner,where yesterday met something new.15The glass remained between two worlds,reflecting neither quite as true.

And when the evening lost its colour,the silver softened into grey.A little dust began to settle20where the old reflections used to stay.

Perhaps the shape was never missing,perhaps the stars had simply moved.Perhaps some things must fade to shadowbefore their outlines can be proved.

25So leave the glass untouched tonight.Let the dimming light fall through.Not every change announces itself,

not every becoming leaves a clue.

Winter arrived without a warning,and the garden turned to grey.Even the birds forgot their songs,and the clouds refused to move away.

5A little lantern stood beside the gate,its glass all cracked and worn,with barely enough light insideto recognise another dawn.

The wind would ask it every evening,10“Why are you still burning here?The road is empty, night is endless,and spring has disappeared.”

The lantern never answered.It had no grand reply.15It only held its little flamebeneath the indifferent sky.

Some nights it nearly flickered out.Some nights it burned so lowthat even the stars above it20couldn't tell it glowed.

But morning came in small beginnings:a drop of rain, a softer breeze,one green leaf unfolding quietlyupon the sleeping trees.

25And though the garden wasn't blooming,though winter hadn't disappeared,the lantern found the smallest comfortin the fact that it was still here.

Perhaps not every light is meant30to chase away the night.Perhaps some simply stay alive

until they learn to shine more bright.

Beneath the moon's decaying light,a glass stood waiting through the night.Among the remedies and cures,one bore a scent the dark made sure.

5The roses leaned, the candles thinned,the frost crept slowly from within.Yet through the dust, through time's undoing,a faded bloom remained worth choosing.

The seasons turned, the gardens died,10the stars grew distant from the tide.And though the path grew cold and strange,some things refused to rearrange.

No name was carved upon the glass,no promise made that it would last.15Yet when the other lights withdrew,the shadows led me where I knew.

Perhaps the moon will lose its glow,perhaps the last of spring will go.Perhaps some things were never meant20to stay untouched by consequence.

Still, when the night forgets to bloom,and silence settles in the room,one bottle rests beneath the blue—

untouched by time,25unemptied,still chosen.

Once, a little star would visitthe window after dusk,leaving warmth upon the glassbefore dissolving into dust.

5Now the night arrives in silence,the curtains barely move.The moon completes its lonely rounds,with nothing left to prove.

And somewhere in the quiet,10a question learns to grow—why do roots cling to the earthwhen spring has ceased to show?

Still, the garden keeps a spacewhere one wildflower once grew.15Though winter settles on its petals,the soil remembers blue.

Perhaps the stars have other skies,perhaps the tides have turned.Perhaps some lanterns lose their flame20before the wick has burned.

Yet every evening, dusk returnsto paint the windows blue.And something stirs beneath the frost,as if it still expects the dew.

25How strange, that even fading thingscan leave such shadows behind.How strange, to keep one candle litfor a sun that may not rise.

The clock moves on. The roses sleep.30The night forgets the tune.

Still, one small window faces east,long after the moon has left the room.

I was still gathering the broken pieces,trying to remember how they fit,searching through the ashesfor something worth saving yet.

5I was learning how to mend the cracks,how to keep the walls from falling,how to bring warmth back to a placewhere winter had been calling.

But somewhere beyond the ruins,10another chapter had begun.While I was searching for the endingthat would let us both become whole,the other half of the storywas learning to exist alone.

15And perhaps that is the cruelest part—not that the pages turned,but that while I was still holdingthe book against the rain,the hands that once held mine20were learning not to reach again.

So the candles slowly disappear,the dust settles where we stood,and I am left among the fragments,wondering if I misunderstood.

25Was I the only one who sawa garden beneath the stone?Was I rebuilding something meant to lastwhile the other heart was learninghow to call the ruins home?

Some things leave without moving,like winter settling into a room.The curtains still remember sunlight,though the afternoon comes too soon.

5There was a road beneath the evening,two shadows walking side by side.One kept a thousand little futures;the other watched the seasons change.

And somewhere in the turning,10the distance learned to speak.It settled in the pauses,in the spaces left betweenwhat was promised in the warmthand what survived the cold.

15I used to leave the windows open,as though the wind might know the way.Now the curtains barely stir at night,and I no longer count the days.

Still, certain songs arrive like rain.20Certain hours remember more.A light across a distant windowcan make a stranger of a door.

How strange that something beautifulcan leave such an ordinary ache—25a cup left untouched on the table,a sentence no one gets to say.

Perhaps the moon was never waiting.Perhaps the sea was bound to turn.Perhaps some fires give us warmth30without teaching us how not to burn.

I won't call the fading cruel.I won't call the silence kind.Some things can be understoodwithout being made to make sense.

35And if the tide should turn one day,if familiar waters cross again,let it find no lantern burningjust to guide it through the rain.

Not every light has to stay lit.40Not every road must lead back home.Some hearts can keep a little tendernessand still learn to walk alone.

Time moves, and so do we.Some things we leave behind,some things we carry quietly.Not every shadow needs chasing,5not every door needs closing.For now, let life unfold—what stays will stay,what comes will come.