In rooms painted quiet with words unsaid,
a boy learns silence like scripture,
memorizing loneliness as if it were
a language only he could understand.
Walls held his secrets in cracks and whispers,
childhood decorated in fragile hope
and the delicate terror
of never being enough
to earn what should be free.
He grew inside mirrors
reflecting disapproval,
searching for kindness in eyes
that turned away
their love dangled like distant stars,
brilliant yet unreachable,
teaching him patience in pain.
Small fists clenched tightly
around invisible truths,
vulnerability punished
with stinging silence,
emotions folded neatly
and hidden beneath beds,
where shadows played pretend
and shame settled as dust.
Neglect etched lessons
deep beneath young skin,
a quiet rage became armor,
each scar a silent promise
to never reveal
what weakness felt like again.
Yet, beneath those defenses,
he dreamed of oceans wide enough
to drown these ghosts,
to break chains he never asked to wear,
determined to turn inherited darkness
into a light he could call his own.
Still, some nights
he hears echoes
from distant rooms,
reminding him gently,
the child within never left,
just learned to speak softer,
waiting patiently for someone
who’d finally listen.