All the miles between us feel like an ocean,  
Breathing sorrow into every quiet moment.  
Caring for you comes so easily,  
Despite the wounds you’ve left on me.  
Every lie you’ve told still stings,  
Foolishly, I cling to the love it brings.  
Grace fills my heart when I see your name,  
Holding back anger, forgiving the pain.  
I ache for the safety I find in your eyes,  
Just once, I wish you’d see past the lies.  
Kindness pours from u when I need it most,  
Love like yours keeps haunting my ghost.  
Maybe one day, we’ll rewrite this story,  
Now I pray for peace, tho it feels so blurry.  
Only you know how to calm my fears,  
Patiently listening thru laughter and tears.  
Quiet nights remind me of your touch,  
Regret fills the spaces where I loved 2 much.  
Still, I dream you’ll feel the same,  
Tethered to hope that whispers your name.  
Under the stars, I send you a prayer,  
Vowing I’ll wait, though life feels unfair.  
When I’m with you, the world feels light,  
Xeroxed memories replay in the quiet night.  
Years may pass, and still I’ll stay,  
Zoning in on love that won’t fade away.

She stands at the counter,
flour dusting her fingertips,
cinnamon curling through the air like a whisper
she’s afraid to speak aloud.

A pinch of salt, a dash of thyme—
she throws them in like she’s casting a spell,
but nothing ever turns out right.
Too much heat, not enough heart,
the flavors never fold into each other,
never blend the way they should.

In her mind, another bowl waits—
one no one can see.
She tosses in “too much,” packs in “not enough,”
folds in “too loud” like stiff egg whites,
sifts in “too big” until it settles in the cracks.
No recipe, no measurements, just
a mess she can never quite fix.

She walks through the grocery store
like a stranger in a foreign place,
staring at shelves lined with things
she doesn’t know how to use.
Aisles stretch too wide, labels blur,
and the pressure knots in her stomach
until she turns around, empty-handed.
She just won’t go next time.

She can bake, though.
She knows the way sugar melts into butter,
how vanilla warms a room,
how patience turns batter to gold.
But sweets feel like a confession,
like proof.
So she says she can’t.
Pretends her hands are clumsy,
her cakes always sink.
Shrinks behind the lie
because it’s easier than the truth.

She just wishes she could cook.
Wishes she could make something people need.
Wishes she didn’t feel like a failed recipe.

I am full of life,
a burst of color spilling into quiet corners,
a voice that fills the empty spaces,
a presence that reaches out—
not to take, but to give,
not to demand, but to share.

And yet,
they pull away,
not because they don’t love me,
not because I am too much,
but because they need the quiet
the way I need the noise.

Still, the silence stings.
It whispers lies—
that I have said too much,
felt too deeply,
loved too hard.
That I am the burden
they do not want to carry.

But that’s not the truth.

The truth is,
they step back because they must,
and I stay, arms open,
learning that love is not measured
by presence alone,
but by the space we allow each other to breathe.

So I sit with the quiet,
not as an enemy,
but as a lesson,
learning that I, too,
can be whole in the waiting,
worthy in the stillness,
enough—
even when I am alone.

That text.
That one little text.
The one I swore I’d never send,
not after all the nights I spent
convincing myself you weren’t worth
the breaking and the bending.

But muscle memory is a stubborn thing—
your name moves like a whisper through my mind,
slipping past reason, settling in my hands,
until my thumbs betray me,
typing out a message
you’ll never care to read.

I know you won’t respond.
I know you won’t care.
I know you’ll smirk to your friends,
say I never really let go,
that I always come undone.

And maybe I do.
Maybe it’s cruel
how you let me believe
we were something more
than something to throw away.
Not even to be recycled,
just discarded—
a past you barely remember.

Yet still, I pause.
Because to not ask,
to not reach,
to not remind you I exist—
feels like cruelty too.

It’s a cruel, cruel world.
And I always thought you
were the light in it.
But the truth is,
I was the light.
I was the warmth.
I was the one who gave
until there was nothing left to take.

So I take back my hands.
I take back my name
from your lips,
my worth from your shadow.
And I let my thumbs rest—
because pressing send
would only be cruel
to me.

Do you feel the weight  
of my name when it flickers across your screen?  
Does it settle in your chest,  
a slow-burning ember,  
or is it just another name, another light,  
another moment you let pass?  

Do you feel the weight  
of hearing my name in a crowded room?  
Does it pull your thoughts toward me,  
the way yours does when I see it—  
buried in scripture,  
a name meant to mean something,  
a name I can’t read without thinking of you?  

Do you feel the weight  
of the hurt you’ve left behind?  
The nights I knew—  
but pretended not to.  
The times you whispered lies into my ear  
while holding someone else in the dark.  
Did you feel the weight  
when I did the same?  
Did it crush you like I hoped it would?  

Do you feel the weight  
when our fingers brush,  
when our eyes meet  
and neither of us dares to look away?  
Do you feel it tighten around your throat  
when you say my name,  
like it does for me?  
Or do you breathe easy,  
unburdened,  
untouched?  

Do you feel the weight  
of silence,  
of wanting to call,  
of wanting to tell me—  
everything, anything—  
but stopping yourself?  
You were always the first person I told,  
my safest place,  
but was I ever that for you?  

Do you feel the weight  
of knowing I would do anything,  
because I know you would too?  
If I say, please,
you listen.  
That has to mean something,  
doesn’t it?  

Do you feel the weight  
of knowing I can’t imagine anyone else?  
That I don’t believe in accidents,  
that I don’t believe you are just another boy
that I don’t believe you are not mine?  

Do you feel the weight  
the way I do?

Lately, I’ve seen a quote circling—
“I hope you get everything you wanted,
and I hope I hear nothing about it.”
People wear it like a badge, sing it like a creed,
as if silence is strength, as if distance is healing.

But I have to disagree.

I do hope you get everything you want—
but I also hope that everything you want is me.

Another quote lingers in my mind—
“Please, God, don’t let me miss him in a wedding dress.”
That, I can stand by.
I hope I am your everything,
but if I never become that,
then let me feel the weight of it,
let me grieve what I must—
and then, let me go.
Let me find the one who sees me as I see them,
who meets me in the place where love is chosen, not just felt.

But don’t let me be the last to know.

I don’t want to learn from whispers,
or a post I wasn’t meant to see.
Give me the dignity of knowing,
the respect of truth from your own lips.

So I rewrite the quote in my own way—
“I hope you get everything you wanted,
and I hope I’m the first to hear of it.”

Because the thought of finding out
that my everything has found their everything elsewhere
through a screen—
that, to me, is what’s devastating.

Maybe I think differently than most.
Maybe I am not your everything.
But I hope I hear of everything.

Fingers trace the pages, hearts untold,  
Aching where the fiction burns her skin.  
Touches linger longer than they should,  
A spark too fierce to quiet deep within.  
Lust is not a whisper—it’s a scream.  

Yearning swells in every glance, unchecked,  
Every fleeting brush ignites the flame,  
And still, she drowns in all that she expects,  
Ravaged by a hunger with no name.  
Never his, yet bound by his embrace,  
In his arms, she burns and lets him take,  
Nothing quenches longing’s cruel embrace,  
Giving in to what she’ll never break.

You weave your words in careful, quiet guise,  
A name withheld, a story left unclear,  
Yet still, I hear the echo of your lies.  

You never speak the truth that meets my eyes,  
The gaps you leave are louder than you fear,  
You weave your words in careful, quiet guise.  

Each hesitant confession I despise,  
Yet love still tethers me, though pain is near,  
And still, I hear the echo of your lies.  

I know the who, the what—your vague replies,  
You dance around the things I hate to hear,  
You weave your words in careful, quiet guise.  

But if I call you out, the moment dies,  
I bite my tongue and swallow down the tear,  
And still, I hear the echo of your lies.  

One day, perhaps, the truth will meet my eyes,  
Or I will leave before it disappears—  
You weave your words in careful, quiet guise,  
Yet still, I hear the echo of your lies.

How can I feel like a stranger,
Only where my blood runs deep?
Maybe it’s because home feels like you,
Even though it could never be.
Some say I should be grateful,
I should be content—
Can’t I still long for more?
Kneeling, I pray for you.

I think we should be together for more reasons than one.
For example, my favorite songs are melodies, and you always liked to hum.
But perhaps the hum of the drum can’t close the chasm of space, so I offer another one.

I shy from touch—I shrink away,
It startles, it stings, it’s never stayed.
To be held always felt like too much,
but when your fingers intertwined with mine,
it didn’t seem to bother me much.
No, now it’s all I want,
because the thought of your hand in mine becoming a memory
is something I can’t unfeel.

Three—I like to think I’m fun, but you keep me moving,
you pull me forward, push me further, make me more.
Four—I can’t imagine another concert
without your hand in mine,
without adding another song to our story’s score.

Five—you know me better than the rest.
They say I don’t tell, but to you, I always do.
Not my own, but the whispers I swore I’d keep—
yet somehow, they slip, because with you, silence never stays.

Six—I was never the main character,
always watching from the wings.
But when I lie at your side, the world quiets,
the chaos stills,
and for once, I am real.

Seven—I never feared death,
but now the thought of our story unfinished
haunts me more than being gone.

Eight—why not try?
Would it be hard? Would it hurt? Would it take work?
Yes.
But what if it could be great?
What if it could be the greatest love story ever told?

Nine—I won’t ask again,
but I’m weary of answering the same question:
Why aren’t we already an “us”?

And finally, ten—
I could write poem after poem about you
and never seem to find the end.

Oh, sweetest sound upon my ear,  
a tethered thread, a spark sincere.  
Your voice, like embers soft and bright,  
calls out my name, and I ignite.  

Not once in passing, lost, unseen,  
but placed with care—intent, serene.  
A whispered note, a steady drum,  
each syllable leaves me undone.  

You speak, and suddenly I’m there,  
a past unshaken, light as air.  
Your tone, familiar, pulls me in—  
a dance between what’s now and then.  

"Goodnight," you say—yet here I stay,  
caught in the warmth you send my way.  
I tell myself it’s just a sound,  
but even now, I come unwound.  

So call it once, call it twice,  
with no regret, with no disguise.  
For every time, without pretense,  
I fall in love and lose defense.

I still call you just to say
the most ordinary things—
a song I loved, a thought I had,
a funny sign on the side of the road.
Your voice still reaches me,
but through miles that stretch like oceans,
and it’s not the same as having you here.

I still go to the places we planned,
but your absence echoes louder
than any crowded room.
Even the puzzles sit unfinished,
pieces scattered like remnants
of a life that once made sense.

You were my safe place,
the steady ground beneath me,
and now I walk unsteady,
reaching for something
that isn’t there.

But soon—soon, you’ll be here.
And for a moment, I’ll breathe again,
watching your smile fill the spaces
that have ached for too long.
I’ll memorize your voice,
trace the feeling of belonging
before it slips away again.

And then, you’ll leave.
And I’ll know the weight of missing you
before it even begins.
Because this time, I understand
how deep absence cuts,
how cruel it is to taste love again
only to have it torn away.

I don’t know why life did this to me,
why I can’t just sit in your presence,
why I have to learn to live
with only shadows of what was.
But if I could freeze time,
I’d stop it the moment
you walk through that door—
before absence has the chance
to find me again.

Within a book, she keeps each hurtful deed,  
A catalog of wrongs beneath each name.  
Her wounded heart, a garden choked by weeds,  
And every page ignites an inner flame.  

She reads their sins in ink that does not fade,  
A testament to pain she cannot shake.  
The trust she gave, betrayed and left unpaid,  
Becomes a chain of bitterness to take.  

She fears the world, where lies and shadows play,  
Believing none are true, that all deceive.  

Her heavy book has left her heart in gray,  
A life too bound by hurt to yet believe.  

If she could set the pages all afire,  
Might love, not anger, rise from such a pyre?

I have never been one to know my worth—
always measuring myself in fractions,
always finding less than whole.
But meeting you took “less”
and carved it down to nothing.

You made me feel unlovable,
a ghost in the room, a shadow at your feet.
Time and time again, you chose everyone else,
and time and time again,
I let you.
I let you because I thought I deserved nothing more.

You kept me on your own timeline,
offering crumbs, never a feast,
and I swallowed every excuse
because I thought even scraps
were something close to love.

“You shouldn’t have told her—
you probably ruined her night.”
But no, she didn’t.
You did.
You ruined my nights, my hope, my peace,
but I let you, didn’t I?
I let you every time I forgave,
every time I made excuses,
every time I prayed you’d change
only to watch you stay exactly the same.

And then—just when I swore
I could take no more—
you held my hand.
For the first time.
For the first time, your skin met mine,
and I let myself believe.

I lay beside you,
my fingers mapping the ridges of your spine,
my lips pressing against your cheek,
the scent of sunscreen tangled in your hair.
I finally heard it from your own mouth,
not from whispers, not from hopeful hearts
“I like you.”
“If things were easier, I’d pursue you.”
And I believed you.

But a week is all it took
for you to pretend none of it happened.
The slow replies.
The canceled plans.
The empty air where effort should have been.
Before, I would have smiled, said it was fine,
but now that I have felt your skin—
it is not fine.
It will never be fine again.

I told myself I wouldn’t cry over a man.
I made myself busy.
I swallowed the sadness,
tried to turn it to anger,
but anger was never strong enough
to silence the truth.

I did not weep for you.
I wept for myself.
For the girl who lost her respect,
who let herself be made so small
she forgot how to stand.

But I am standing now.
And I am not unlovable.
I deserve more than the empty space you left behind.
I would have given you the world—
and you wouldn’t have even given me dinner.

No more.
No more waiting.
No more hoping.
No more settling for less than what I deserve.
I am learning my worth.
And this time, I will not forget it.

I don’t like to be touched, I say.
A belief I stitched into myself not long ago.
I used to claim physical touch as my love language—
until something shifted.

I think it was control.
I wanted to decide when, how, and who,
but the weight of permission made it complicated.
How do you tell a friend—
a friend whose love is expressed in the casual brush of an arm,
the absentminded squeeze of a shoulder—
that touch must be earned, requested, granted?
It felt uncomfortable, unnatural,
so instead, I let the discomfort settle in my bones
until it hardened into a rule:
I do not like to be touched.

And I was serious about it.
Loyal to my own decree.
I made it known, made it clear,
crossed my T’s, dotted my I’s,
left no room for misunderstanding.
And so the world adapted.
Hugs became waves.
My mother’s comforting hand withdrew.
My best friend no longer leaned into me.
I was content—
it was exactly what I asked for.

Until I realized the absence of touch
had hollowed something out inside me.
A loneliness that festered beneath my skin.
Still, I ignored it.
I was firm in my boundaries—
until I met you.

With you, I caved.
A brush of our legs, and I shivered.
Something thawed,
something softened,
and the weight I carried felt lighter in your presence.
It was messy,
but I clung to it, to you.

Then you left,
and with you went the comfort I had forgotten I needed.
The longing came back, sharper this time,
but now, no arms to fall into.
No shoulder to rest my head on.
I had spoken my truth so often, so passionately,
that now it had become my prison.

The last time I saw you,
you let me stay in your arms until I was ready to go.
I hadn’t been held like that—
maybe ever.
It has been almost four months since,
and I can count on two hands the number of times
I’ve been embraced since you walked away.

Tonight, for the first time since goodbye,
I hugged a pillow as I cried on the couch.
Because I cannot explain how deeply I need to feel again.
And soon, we will be reunited.
For a moment, I might get that feeling back.

But I know you are not my forever,
and soon, the loneliness will return.
Sometimes, I wish I had kept my silence.
It is my own fault no one reaches for me.
Not something worthy of tears.
But oh,
how desperately,
how achingly,
I crave to be held.

Tangled in memories of open arms,
I used to melt into every embrace,
but now even a brush of skin
sends a shiver I can’t explain.

Once, touch felt like home,
a language spoken without words.
Now it lingers like an echo,
familiar yet distant, haunting me.

Underneath the discomfort,
there’s an ache I can’t name—
is it emptiness, is it longing,
or is it just him?

Clutching at air, at absence,
I tell myself I don’t need it,
but my body remembers
the last time I truly did.

Held for the last time,
three months and counting,
by the only arms that ever
felt like they wouldn’t let go.

You twist the truth, but I can read the signs,  
Each half-spun tale ignites a darker fire,  
And love decays beneath your thin designs.  

You speak in riddles, dodging clear confines,  
Yet every name you bury fuels my ire,  
You twist the truth, but I can read the signs.  

You think me blind, but darling, I divine  
The ghosts you hide—I know your every liar,  
And love decays beneath your thin designs.  

I let it slide, my silence once benign,  
But venom drips from all that you conspire,  
You twist the truth, but I can read the signs.  

I dream of ways to make your secrets mine,  
To watch you squirm beneath the tangled wire,  
And love decays beneath your thin designs.  

Still, here I stay—though fury blurs the lines,  
Your pretty words are drowning in the mire,  
You twist the truth, but I can read the signs,  
And love decays beneath your thin designs.

You call at all hours deep into the night,
I wake just to answer, though weary and worn,
Yet never a moment is mine in your sight.

I offer you wisdom, I soften your plight,
I listen to burdens I’ve no need to mourn—
You call at all hours deep into the night.

You argue, insisting your troubles hold might,
Proclaiming my struggles are easy, forlorn,
Yet never a moment is mine in your sight.

No bills to be paid, no rent set in sight,
While I toil and labor from dusk until dawn—
You call at all hours deep into the night.

My world feels so heavy, yet silent, polite,
While yours spins in dramas that vanish by morn,
Yet never a moment is mine in your sight.

Were we not bound by blood, I’d let go of this fight,
For love should be given, not endlessly torn
You call at all hours deep into the night,
Yet never a moment is mine in your sight.