I don’t want to ruin this before it begins.
I can feel it, the way my chest tightens when the silence stretches just a little too long, the way my stomach flips when I’m left alone with my thoughts for just a moment too long. I catch myself pacing, picking apart every last word exchanged, looking for hidden meanings that aren’t there.
It’s not about him, really.
It’s the ghosts of men who promised me they would stay and then vanished. It’s the coldness of waiting for words that never came, the sickening drop in my stomach when I realized I wasn’t worth the consistency I craved. It’s every “good morning” that stopped without warning, every “I’m not like the others” that turned out to be a lie.
And now there is him.
He feels different. There’s a calm in him, a quiet strength I’m not used to. He seems to be at peace in places where I have only known chaos. He moves at his own pace, slow and steady, never rushing what doesn’t need to be rushed, not pulling me in too fast, but not pushing me away either.
He is emotionally independent, and I can tell he is careful with his energy, careful with his days. I know he’s just stepped out of the wreckage of a marriage, and I know he’s still finding his footing in the world again. We’re taking this slow, and I understand that. I respect it.
But the silence still stings.
He’s teaching me patience. Teaching me to breathe when the quiet comes, to let the empty space between us simply be empty instead of something I need to fill with a thousand frantic words to prove I matter. He is showing me that connection can exist without constant proof, that I don’t have to perform to be seen.
It’s the hardest lesson, this learning to be still.
Because the part of me that has been left, ghosted, and overlooked is always begging me to run, to pull away before he does, to protect myself before I have to watch him leave.
I don’t want to sabotage this, but it’s like the old hurt in me reaches out to test him. To see if he’ll bend when I lean, to see if he’ll pull me closer when I start to drift.
It’s a strange dance, this thing we’re building. It is a gentle breeze tangled with a hurricane, a soft rain falling over a forest fire. I want to let it rain, to let it cool the fear in me, to let it wash away the ashes of what I’ve lost before. I want to let him show me who he is, instead of letting the ghosts of who came before him dictate the story we’re writing now.
It’s new. It’s uncertain. It’s terrifying.
But I am trying. I am trying to let him be who he is without demanding he fix what he didn’t break. I am trying to let the softness stay, to let the days pass without testing him, to believe that sometimes people mean what they say.
That maybe, he really isn’t going anywhere.
Tag: poetry
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He came into my life quietly, like a storm rolling in under soft skies. At first, it was light, easy, a spark that felt like a promise. A message here, a glance there, the kind of beginning that makes you wonder what it could become. It was soft. I was soft.
But somewhere along the way, softness turned into chaos.
It became a game neither of us admitted we were playing. I would spiral, drunk off my emotions, off the longing, off the way he knew how to show up just enough to keep me tethered. He would let me unravel, let me spill out in messy paragraphs of midnight confessions, and he would take it. He would take all of it, responding just enough, never too much, never too little. He would stay.
We would dance in circles, burning through the same conversation on different days. Me, screaming in silence for him to prove me wrong, to prove that he could be more. Him, showing up when it was convenient, when the pull of me was too loud to ignore, when the silence from me became heavy enough to make him move.
And somehow, we never stop. We never let go.
Ten months of this. Ten months of push, pull, crash, burn, repeat. Ten months of “come over,” “I miss you,” “I can’t do this anymore,” “okay, see you soon.” Ten months of stolen moments that end as quickly as they begin. Ten months of me telling myself that this is just what it is, of him taking what he needs, of me giving it, of him letting me feel like maybe, just maybe, I’m the exception, only to remind me that I’m not.
It’s toxic, the way we orbit each other.
It’s the way he texts back after I blow up his phone, like nothing happened, like my breakdowns are just background noise to the quiet chaos we share. It’s the way he hugs me before he leaves, the way he kisses me softly after making me feel like nothing, the way he reminds me without words that he’ll always come back because he knows I’ll open the door.
It’s the way I hate it, but crave it. The way he hates it, but stays.
We are toxic. He and I, we are a war disguised as routine. A battlefield of unspoken words and unmet needs, a graveyard of promises neither of us made, but both of us keep stepping over. It is the kind of connection that feels like a cigarette you can’t quit, the kind that burns you slow, that leaves you coughing, but keeps you reaching for one more drag.
It is wanting him when he is absent, and resenting him when he is present. It is knowing that he won’t change, and refusing to let him go. It is him knowing that I won’t stop trying, and refusing to give me more. It is a cycle. It is a sickness. It is an addiction dressed up as a connection.
It’s the way we keep doing this, over and over, as if we’re waiting for the other to end it first, as if we are testing who will walk away, who will stop replying, who will let the door close. Neither of us do. We let it hang open, wide enough to crawl back through, just enough to keep the tie alive, just enough to keep the damage going.
This is what it is. A toxic, chaotic, unending, twisted dance between two people who don’t know how to let each other go.
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I’ve spent so many nights tracing the edges of my own thoughts, mapping the labyrinth of my heart by moonlight, wondering which corridors still held echoes of a love I once believed could heal me. I catalogued every silence, every breadcrumb, every shard of doubt he left in my path, convinced that if I pieced it all together, the picture would finally make sense. But last night, as I watched the flames dance in my mind’s eye, I realized something both terrifying and exhilarating: the person I could only become would have to rise from the ashes of who I was.
I. The Hunger for Unfinished Stories
I have always been drawn to half-written novels: to the chapters that end on a question mark, to the voices suspended in mid-confession, to the lingering “what-ifs” that hum in the space between two souls. I thought it was romance; that ache, that craving for something unresolved. In truth, it was my own longing for purpose. If I could fix the unfixable, if I could draw someone else’s pain into the safety of my arms, then maybe I could prove I mattered.
But no one ever asked me what I needed. I poured love into cracked vessels, convinced that my devotion could seal every fracture. I chased illusions down gravel roads and through deserted parking lots, whispering prayers that he would remember my name. And when the echo of my own voice was all that remained, I realized I’d been running after smoke.
II. The Barbed Wire of My Own Making
My body is a map of battles fought and scars earned. I ink devotion and defiance across my skin, as if each tattoo were a lullaby for the parts of me that refused to be forgotten. But I built walls lined with barbed wire, beautiful, yes, but still barbed. I tested every hand that reached for me: “Can you handle this fire? Can you hold these depths?” And when they faltered, I branded their retreat as rejection rather than self-preservation.
I conflated my worth with their endurance. I thought, if they stay, I’m enough. If they leave, I’m not. But the truth is simpler and harsher: they left because they couldn’t carry the weight of my truth, not because my truth was too much, but because they were never meant to bear it. The fault was not in my depth, but in my belief that depth required an audience.
III. A Mirror of Shattered Glass
For so long, I held my reflection up to their eyes. I asked, “Do you see me?” and waited for an answer that never came. I catalogued every glance, every scroll past, every ghosted read receipt as if I were deciphering code. I convinced myself the signals were out there, that meaning dripped from every profile view, every car passed in the night.
But a mirror that only shows us fragments isn’t a mirror; it’s a broken promise. I was chasing the sensation of being wanted, not the truth of being loved. I wanted to feel special again, felt alive in that electric moment when someone finally sees you.
IV. The Ritual of Burning
Last night, I lit a candle for every piece of myself I’d offered to the wrong people: the midnight whispers, the raw confessions, the months spent waiting by my front door. And as the wax pooled and the wick curled, I felt something shift. I whispered to the darkness, “I’m done.” Each flicker of flame was a release, of expectation, of regret, of every tiny hope I’d clung to.
Because here’s the raw, unquiet truth: the only way to truly become is to burn away the parts of yourself that no longer serve you. You must let your illusions catch fire so the real embers of your soul can glow. You must allow the ache of old losses to purify you, rather than define you.
V. The Becoming Era
I stand now at the cusp of something fierce and uncharted… a becoming era. I am no longer the girl who waits for someone else to ignite her spark. I am the flame, alive on her own terms. I am the poem, unsilenced. I am the phoenix, learning to trust gravity, learning that the fall doesn’t have to destroy me; it can teach me to rise.
The person I could only become would emerge from this crucible of loss and longing. Who I am now, forged in flame, is someone who honors her own hunger without sacrificing her worth. Someone who inks her story in bold strokes, not waiting for an editor’s approval. Someone who holds herself, a fierce, tender territory; and refuses to barter her peace for crumbs of attention.
VI. What Remains, What Blooms
In the ashes of my old self, I find a garden.
The tender shoots of self respect.
The wild blooms of creative obsession.
The roots of boundaries that nourish rather than constrict.I feel their absence like an open wound, but not as a void I must fill. Instead, it’s a space I can plant seeds of my own making. I will cultivate joy, not as an antidote to pain, but as a companion to it. I will write my truths in long, unbroken lines, no longer afraid of what a full confession might reveal.
VII. An Invitation to Myself
So here’s my vow to me:
- I will light my own candles when the world grows dark.
- I will unlearn the language of chasing and learn the dialect of presence.
- I will decline projects that ask me to fix others before fixing myself.
- I will feed my fire with my own breath, not with someone else’s attention.
If this is the era of becoming, then let it be written in soot and flame. Let it be sung in the quiet moments when I choose silence over pleading, peace over proving, freedom over fear.
I was never meant to be forgotten. I was meant to be unforgettable; first to myself, then to anyone who has the courage to witness my full light. And now, as the last candle guttered out, I felt a calm settle over me: a knowing that I am enough, just as I am, and that the only story I need to finish is my own.
trailofchapters 