Joy is a Net

Some mornings arrive with arms wide open,  

spilling sunlight in impossible directions.  

You, with your cupped hands, catch  

all the gold slipping through the cracks.  

Joy isn't loud, but it hums softly,  

a lantern swinging in an unseen breeze.  

It gathers the broken corners of us,  

patchworks them into something whole again.  

When I was five, my mother whispered,  

"Be the reason someone's soul feels lighter."  

At the time, I thought she meant laughter.  

But I think she meant courage, meant kindness,  

meant stringing together those invisible threads  

that stretch between strangers and friends alike.  

Because sometimes joy is not for us alone;  

it’s a bridge we build for someone else to cross.  

I see you now, stacking moments like stones,  

pressing gentleness into the marrow of living.  

One day, you'll realize you've woven nets too—  

holding light for all those slipping through.