I was not born in a garden.
I was born on a battlefield
where silence was louder than thunder
and grief wore my name like armor.
There are days I still wake up
with loss sitting on my chest,
a weight I pretend
is just muscle.
I have carried anger
like Achilles carried his blade;
sharp, necessary,
heavy enough to cut the hands that hold it.
Sometimes I miss
who I was
before I understood
that people can disappear.
There are nights
I descend into myself
like a pilgrim without a map,
corridors of doubt,
rooms lined with every word
I wish I had said louder.
I have knelt before mirrors
as if they were judges.
I have counted my flaws
like prayer beads.
I have mistaken survival
for strength.
I have wanted love
like oxygen,
and feared it
just the same.
But listen:
Even in the underworld
there are stars
if you dare to look up.
Even in the wreckage
there are bones
that refuse to break.
Time may bruise the body,
may fracture pride,
may scatter the voices we once followed;
but it cannot erase
the girl who kept getting up.
The girl who learned
how to breathe underwater
and call it living.
I am not the rage.
I am not the ruin.
I am not the ache
that visits at 2 a.m.
I am the cathedral
built from what tried to destroy me.
And if time comes with its steady hands
to fold me into dust;
let it find
that something in me
still burns.