Heaven has to be real, Dad.
Because if it’s not,
then where the hell do I send all this love?

Where do I put the stories I was saving to tell you,
the ones I practiced in my head,
just in case you came back
for five more minutes?

I’m doing it now, you know.
The life.
The one you never got to live.

I eat dinner alone, just like you did.
I laugh at jokes you'd love.
I fix things the way you tried to teach me
except you’re not here to tell me I’m doing it wrong.
Or that you're proud.
God, I would've given anything
just to hear you say you're proud.

I go to places you dreamed of.
I stand where you wanted to stand.
I look up at the sky you always talked about

but it never feels like enough
because you can’t see it with me.
You can’t say,
"That’s beautiful, kid."
And I don’t know how to feel joy
without feeling guilty for surviving you.

Some nights,
I swear I hear your voice when I’m between sleep and memory.
You say,
"Keep going."
But I don’t know if that’s you
or just the echo of my need.

I try to believe you’re somewhere,
watching.
But most days I feel like I’m putting on a show
for a ghost
who forgot how to clap.

I’ve prayed.
God knows I’ve prayed.
But prayers feel like messages sent to old phone numbers.
No bounce-back.
No reply.
Just the silence of a universe
that took you too soon
and gave nothing back.

So Heaven has to be real, Dad.
Because otherwise I’m loving a corpse.
Otherwise I’m walking through your old dreams
with no one to hand them to.

Otherwise I’m just
your unfinished sentence.
A comma hanging midair
where your voice should’ve kept going.

Please let it be real.
Please let there be more.
Please tell me
you didn’t disappear into the dirt
without at least one window left open
for me to say goodbye properly.

Because I wasn’t ready.

And you
weren’t
done.