i carry no hatred, only a quiet understanding.
what was once heavy in my chest is now just a memory,
soft and fleeting, like smoke dissolving into air.
you taught me the strength of leaving,
the grace in letting go without bitterness.
i am no longer bound to the ache of us,
but i’ll carry the lessons like whispers
of who i’ve grown to be.

how do i still care
when you made it clear
that i am nothing more
than a shadow in your story?
you left,
and even when i buried your name,
some piece of me stayed awake,
still reaching, still holding,
still soft when i should be stone.

you came back,
not with love,
not with apologies,
but with the weight of your presence.
and i should’ve walked away,
should’ve turned my back,
should’ve spat words that burn
but instead, i lingered,
hate tangled with love,
a storm in my chest
i can’t silence.

how am i so unbothered,
yet so chained?
how do i hate you,
yet still long to hold the shattered pieces
of what we could’ve been?
i don’t need you,
but sometimes i do,
when life pushes me into corners
only you know how to numb.

you’ve taught me truths
that cut deeper than any lie.
you, the lesson i never asked for,
the weight sent by something higher.
i see through you,
past the masks, past the *******,
to the person you refuse to be.
and yet i care.
why the hell do i care?

do i stay,
tethering myself to the fleeting comfort
of your situational presence?
or do i walk away,
letting the pain settle like ash,
knowing it will choke me anyway?

i feel the pull of both
to leave, to stay,
to love, to hate,
to care, to not.
and in this chaos,
i wonder:
is it strength or weakness
to care for someone
who’s never been anything but a lesson?

i wonder what it’s like to be taken away, taken away from the only thing you know, the only people you know. i wonder what it’s like to be left wondering if you ever did something wrong, if it was your fault that this all happened, or maybe it’s just bad luck. i wonder what it’s like to be in a new, unknown place that has far exceeded your comfort, your home, your life, everything you’ve ever known. i wonder what it’s like to be taken away from everything you’ve ever felt safe, comfortable, and happy with. i wonder what it’s like to be a cat.

i’ve forgotten about you, for the most part. but there are those small fleeting moments where you appear again, taking different forms.
in the clouds, in a phrase, in a specific name or word.
i keep asking myself why, but then i remember that forgetting doesn’t mean erasing.
it means tucking pieces of you away in places i don’t visit often,
only for you to surface when i least expect it.
maybe that’s what memory is,
not a clean slate but a mosaic of the things we carry,
even when we think we’ve let them go.

this is for every word i swallowed,
for every time i told myself,
“it’s not worth the fight.”
for all the nights i stayed up rewriting the ending,
a version where you stayed,
where we were enough,
where i didn’t wake up with an ache in my chest.

this is an apology letter
to the girl i used to be.
to the one who thought love
meant sacrificing everything,
even herself.
to the version of me
that believed your “hi”
meant more than a habit you couldn’t shake.

this is for the hours i spent
tracing your face in my mind,
memorizing the way your voice cracked
when you said my name,
as if it held weight.
this is for the way you convinced me
that “sorry” could glue a shattered heart.

you came back,
and i let you.
every **** time.
because even after all the wreckage,
there was still a part of me
that hoped you’d choose me.
but hope is a dangerous thing,
and i learned that the hard way.

this is for the space i carved out for you
in a life i was finally learning to love.
for the way you slipped back in
like you’d never left.
like i hadn’t spent months
rebuilding what you broke.

if you leave again,
i won’t stop you.
not this time.
because i’ve realised
you’re a storm i can’t survive twice.
but if you stay,
know this:
we’re not the same people anymore.
and maybe that’s the tragedy,
or maybe that’s the cure.

family is a storm that never fades,
tides of love mixed with bitter shades.
we try to mend what’s broken,
but some pieces are too scattered, too worn.

we hold on, though it’s hard to breathe,
still searching for calm beneath the leaves.
in the silence, we hope and pray,
that tomorrow will bring a brighter day.

these days, it seems, no one wants to read,
caught in a world of quick and instant feed.
scrolling screens and voices on demand,
the art of patience slipping from our hands.

two lines here, three words there,
a glance is all that most can spare.
they skim the surface, miss the deep,
the poems that linger, the thoughts that seep.

but maybe it’s better if they don’t see,
let them have their quick and easy.
i’ll take the lines that cut me deep,
keep the words they never keep.