I desperately wanted to write a poem
With words that would capture that my home
Is just a house with people in it,
A house where I can sometimes laugh a bit.
But sometimes, late at night, when I hear them fight,
I pretend it’s just another quiet night.

My house—sometimes too quiet, sometimes too noisy,
Sometimes it is fun, but never truly cozy.
The poem I never wrote about the doors,
The emptiness and little wars,
Because I never found the words to explain
How my lovely house became a place of pain.

I find it scary to write a poem,
because what if people don’t like it?
Or worse — what if they do,
and it means they’re broken too?

Does it mean they also can’t find
peace and treasure in their mind?
Does it mean they feel the same,
so my pain is not a claim?

The fear, the loss, the pain and everything
If its not mine does it leave me as nothing?

Dear best friend,
Sometimes I wish you knew how much you mean to me,
You are all and more than I ever dreamed you’d be.
The way you make me smile, the way you make me laugh,
And when I felt broken, you held me on my behalf.

I love the way you speak, with kindness in your heart,
Like every soul is whole, not just a fractured part.
I love the way you see the world, so sparkly, so bright,
As if there will always be a light

But sometimes I wonder what battles you fight,
The tears you’ve been hiding alone in the night.
I ask myself softly: what don’t you say?
How much of your hurt do you lock far away?

It’s almost been a year—
a year since I last saw you smile,
since I talked with you,
since I heard your voice,

A year of crying,
a year of trying to understand,
a year of sinking into silence and grief—
a year since you breathed.