June Folding into Brightness

In June we learn how streets can hold a different kind of pride

how banners catch on wind like something finally allowed to shine in light

we speak each other’s becoming aloud, refusing to lose the shape of a name

there is laughter stitched into sidewalks, a stubborn, uncontained joy

the city stops pretending it does not know us, even in passing city

and every clock feels less like judgment and more like borrowed time

We arrive carrying what we used to hide, rewritten by time

our steps no longer asking permission to exist in pride

even the rain seems to soften, as if it understands the city

that brightness is not always gentle, but it is still a kind of light

we learn to recognize ourselves not as fragments, but as shared joy

and call each other forward by whatever name

No single name can hold the fullness we make of name

we spill beyond it, beyond maps that tried to measure us in time

each gathering a small rebellion shaped like joy

each conversation a refusal to be reduced to pride

we walk through the world as if it has finally remembered light

and even the tallest buildings feel briefly human in the city

In the city we remake distance into closeness, city

we speak until language forgets it was ever meant to confine name

what once felt like shadowed corners now open into light

as if the calendar itself has been waiting for this time

for bodies to move without apology, without negotiation, without pride

for joy to stop being rare and start being shared joy

Joy becomes a direction we can follow through joy

not a secret anymore, not something we borrow from the city

but something built from every refusal to shrink pride

we pass it hand to hand like something truer than name

something that outlives the hourglass, outlives time

something that turns even silence into light

And so we stand here in light and in light

no longer asking whether we deserve joy

no longer waiting for permission from time

we are already here, already part of city pride light name joy city time