They do not speak of dying,
not in the quiet grocery line,
not beneath the flicker of café lights,
not when the sky loosens its robe of stars,
and oh, what a grave mistake.

For death is not some villain in a cloak,
but the oldest truth,
the shadow stitched to your soles,
the hush behind the heartbeat.
And if you dare to meet it,
not with dread, but with reverence,
you live.

Not someday.
Now.

With a fire that does not ask for permission,
you will step out of the anger rooms,
shed the shroud of “what will they think,”
and walk barefoot into your wild life,
untamed, imperfect, and exquisitely yours.

A child who has tasted death’s breath,
returns with eyes older than calendars,
not brave, but lucid.
Not reckless, but awake.

You see, it is not courage,
to sip the rain like wine,
to laugh so hard the stars come closer,
it is logic.
It is sense.
It is the compass of those who know the road ends,
so they sing while walking.

So love.
Not as a performance, but as a pulse.

Learn.
Not for praise, but for wonder.

Taste.
The peach, the kiss, the grief, the salt.

And leave behind no legacy but this:

That you were here.
Truly.
Madly.
Moment by moment, as a brief candle,
burning unapologetically in the wind.