the soft light from
across
the room
cast a shadow
on half of you
and i thought to myself,
i am in love.
her ******* were
still swollen
from the child we lost,
a quiet weight between us
that neither of us could hold.

she smiled her sleepy
smile and said,
"i want this moment to last forever."

and i thought to myself,
i will be okay.
i said this with more
hope than honesty.

and honestly,
i gave up on hope
the day you aborted our child.

i lay there,
a hollow figure,
a man made of silence and waiting,
watching you carry a burden
i had no right to share.

my voice, a whisper trapped
behind fears I couldn’t overcome.
no place at the table,
no say in the body
that carried what was partly mine.

the room grew colder,
not from the night,
but from the space
between your heartbeat and mine.

i was powerless.
like a shadow on the wall,
there but unseen,
a ghost with no name,
no claim to the life
that never had a chance to be.

the loneliness was a quiet scream,
a thousand empty hands
reaching for something
that slipped through fingers
no matter how tight i clenched.

and still,
there was love,
fractured, fading,
a fragile echo
in the hollow of my chest.
love for the life
that'll never exist
that I'll never experience.

you drifted to sleep,
the soft rise and fall of your breath
a reminder i could not change
what had been taken from us.
what was taken from me..

and i whispered
to the empty room,
to the child i’d never hold—
i would’ve named you
after the quiet.