You say it with such conviction.
You say the wind won’t carry you away,
that no other will tempt you with her smile,
no storm will ever pull you from my side.
Your arms, strong and sure,
promise to hold me through every trembling night.
When I break, when I fall,
you will catch me,
every time, every way.
No silence too deep, or distance too far,
no shadow too dark for your light to reach.
You say it like you mean it.
I am here.
I will stay.
I won't hurt you.
And I believe you.
Your hands are soft and gentle,
but every touch awakens scars
woven through my skin.
You say my name, soft as a prayer,
but it unravels into echoes
of a voice I can't forget.
I know you're not him.
I want to meet you in the quiet,
give you more than this tangle of fear,
but my body holds memories
of storms I can’t let go of.
So I pull away,
not because I don’t love you,
but because I’m still learning
how to feel safe in the light.
I love you, but I can't.
Not yet. I'm sorry.
Please don't let go.
His patient, gentle voice floats through the noise.
She listens, wanting to believe.
Her hands, scarred from holding too tightly
to promises that unraveled,
curl into fists, then open again,
learning to let go.
He reaches without reaching.
Arms steady, strong,
whisper softly,
It's safe to fall here.
She inches forward,
not knowing the ending,
but sensing a beginning,
fragile trust stitched together,
one breath, one moment at a time.
There are ghosts here.
Stitched into the seams of wallpaper,
whispers woven into the grain of floorboards.
They press against the windows at night,
cold breath fogging the glass,
revealing images of a childhood lost.
They crawl through cracks in the ceiling,
falling like maggots on my skin,
fingers slither up my legs like snakes,
slipping under my pretty pink dress
to a place where innocence once hid.
Every door shudders with their secrets,
every corner curves into a memory.
They sit on my bed,
wearing his synthetic smile,
watching me, silently,
waiting.
I can’t stay here,
with their hands pulling at my shadow,
their weight crushing my chest.
I want to walk into light
to a place they can't reach,
and build a new life
where I can be whole again,
and breathe air unchained by yesterday.
There are too many ghosts here,
whispers in walls,
shadows haunting hallways,
fear and footsteps,
and echoes I can't forget.
This place is not Home,
it's just the house I grew up in,
a shell I’ve outgrown,
a mirror reflecting someone
I don’t want to be anymore.
Home should be where your heart is,
where it jumps for joy,
dances and sings,
loves and breaks and loves again.
My heart is far from this place.
Near a horizon I’ve never touched,
where birds fly and dreams come true,
and the sky feels like it belongs to me.
I want to leave my ghosts behind,
step through a new front door,
where the weight of yesterday fades,
where the air carries only tomorrows,
and my heart can learn
to dance and love and dream again.
I want to find Home.
He says he went there once,
said so at his parole hearing.
Hands folded, face downcast,
whispering his sins into the dark lattice.
The priest's calm and holy voice
spoke of absolution,
mercy endless as the skies.
God forgives you, my son. Go in peace.
I wonder if God heard me crying that night,
if He saw my hands trembling,
a child's voice lost under his weight.
Did He hear my whispered prayers
for it to stop? For it to end?
Or was His ear tuned only to the sinner's regret?
They say forgiveness is divine,
but I am flesh and bone,
blood that stains and scars that still scream.
My heart beats with fury, not grace,
my soul twists in the fire of memory,
too human to absolve, too fragile to forget.
He walked out lighter,
his sins left behind on a wooden bench,
while I carry his darkness
like a stone in my chest,
sharp, unyielding,
a weight only I can feel.
Let God forgive him.
Let the heavens open for his soul.
But I am no God.
I'm just a girl who can't forget,
and can't set him free.
Are you there, God?
It's me again.
I think I’m finding my way.
The road is still uneven and tangled with questions,
but somehow, I keep moving forward.
I can’t always see the next step,
but it turns out there are people who can help me.
The ones who light the path when I can’t see it,
who steady my hands when they shake,
who remind me that even doubt
can be part of faith.
Did you send them, God?
These voices, these hands, these hearts
that show up right when I need them?
They walk beside me,
hold the map when I lose sight of it,
whisper keep going when I forget how.
I used to think I had to do it alone,
had to have all the answers,
to carve my own way
through the wilderness of becoming me.
But now I see
that it was never meant to be lonely here.
So thank you for the ones who remind me,
who love me toward the light,
who make the world feel less like a maze
and more like a place where I belong.
Are you there, God?
I think you are.
I think you always were,
even when I couldn't find you.
--
As before, the title is obviously and shamelessly borrowed from Judy Blume's novel, Are You There God, It's Me, Margaret.
Are you there, God?
I'm still unsure.
Still fighting off ghosts
in dark corners
where answers never seem to land.
I’m all grown up now, and off to grad school,
still measuring my worth in papers and exams,
in the endless not-yet of becoming me.
I’m still caught between here and there,
the girl I was, and the woman
I’m afraid to become.
Still not sure what that means,
or how I'm supposed to fit
in a world that wasn't meant
for someone like me.
Do you hear me in the small moments?
The trembling questions,
the tangled prayers caught
between hope and doubt?
I don’t need thunder or signs.
Just the feeling that you see me,
still trying to make sense
of this messy, marvelous world.
---
*Title obviously and shamelessly borrowed from Judy Blume's novel Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. Hope she doesn't mind.
Parole denied.
A symphony in two words.
Hands clenched,
bracing for the sound
of his footsteps behind her,
a fear she’ll never unlearn.
But there is no sound.
No shadow waiting
to swallow the light.
He will stay where he belongs,
not free to rewrite the story,
not free to forget
what she cannot.
The sky is brighter than she remembers.
The air sings with the sound of something new.
Maybe it’s hope.
Or maybe it’s the sound
of her testimony
still ringing
in their ears.
Steam curls like clouds of mist,
dark liquid pools in porcelain calm.
A quiet revolution,
silently spreads warmth and sunlight
through the fog of morning.
Bitterness hums in counterpoint
to sweetness stirred in,
mirroring life’s contradictions
in a cup.
Symphony of survival and solace,
Each cup a promise
of another day.
How do I forgive a ghost
that only exists in memories?
What does it mean to let go,
when the bruises have faded,
but the heart won't forget?
Sometimes, a faint voice,
a fleeting echo,
almost within reach,
but still so far away:
Forgiveness, not absolution.
Not for him, for me.
So I can bloom,
breathe,
and finally be free.
We pause,
as the world moves on.
Light a candle,
whisper your name
to an empty chair,
a prayer against forgetting.
We raise a glass,
to memories found in faded photographs,
to sleepless nights sharing endless tears,
and laughter that sometimes made us whole.
We love you, Anna,
more than you knew.
And wish you'd stayed
long enough to know
why we miss you so much.
I know you're not him.
Your touch is soft and gentle.
I want to feel it.
Embrace it.
Wrap myself in your strength
and feel my heart
beat in perfect rhythm
with yours.
But he's still there,
twisting around my body like a snake,
bitter and poisonous,
pushing me away
from the one thing
that might make me whole again.
She stands before the panel,
their faces etched with indifference,
as if justice could be weighed
on scales too clean to touch truth.
She reads her statement
voice trembling,
each word chosen carefully.
She names him,
recounts what he did.
She cries, takes a sip of water,
recovers her composure.
She reads about his hands,
his betrayal,
the innocence he stole.
Recounts unspeakable horrors,
years of counseling,
an almost suicide.
She speaks for the little girl
who hid in corners
and learned to make herself
smaller than the pain.
She speaks for the grown-up girl
who never asked for this fight,
but now holds her ground
like a fortress rebuilt from ruin.
They glance down at papers,
statistics, the time he has served,
as if healing is somehow measured
in years behind bars.
She knows better.
There is no parole for her,
no reprieve from her wounds.
When she finishes,
the silence echoes louder than his guilt.
She does not look at him.
She does not need to.
Her truth is a verdict
she will carry
long after they decide
whether to set him free.
Time served will never be enough.
Please forgive me
says the shadow
in the corner of her childhood,
the hands that stole
the only thing that was hers.
She considers his words
with a knot in her chest,
tries to believe in a redemption
she doesn’t owe him.
But it isn’t a gift
wrapped in pretty paper;
it’s a battle,
fought in the silence
of a woman grown
who still feels
the little girl's fear.
Maybe one day,
she’ll find the strength.
Or maybe the price of freedom
will be letting his words echo,
never granting absolution.
Oh steadfast love, who works with tireless grace,
Through every mess, you glide with steady care.
No dust nor crumb escapes your firm embrace,
You cleanse the chaos scattered everywhere.
Your spinning brush, a quiet, faithful knight,
Transforms my floors and leaves them pure, refined.
With every pass, you bring my heart delight,
A soothing sound that calms my cluttered mind.
Through tangled cords and dirt that's hard to see,
You venture on, undaunted in your quest.
No greater love could labor silently,
And leave behind such peace at my behest.
Oh humble friend, what loyalty you've shown
Each time you sweep disorder from my home.
I see you,
curled up like a leaf after a storm,
wondering if this is all it will ever be,
if the hurt will always be there.
You don’t have to carry this alone.
I know you don’t trust anyone now,
but one day you’ll find friends
who speak to the parts of you
you think no one could understand.
I know the nights are heavy,
filled with questions no one answers,
memories you can't stop replaying.
But there will be people who listen,
who see you, teach you
how to turn pain into something
that blooms instead of burns.
It’s okay to cry,
to scream.
to stop pretending you're fine.
It’s okay to not know
how to put words to everything breaking inside.
But please,
don’t let the darkness convince you
that what happened is all that you are.
You are so much more.
More than the hurt, more than the betrayal,
more than the silence you wear like armor.
There’s still laughter waiting,
still light in the corners
where you’re too scared to look.
Keep going.
One breath at a time,
one step,
even when it feels like falling.
You are stronger than you know.
Let yourself feel. Let yourself dream.
Let yourself believe that one day
you’ll look back and see
how strong you really are.
Words are soft bridges,
ravaged by rivers of lies.
Actions are the stones
I place my weight upon,
first tentative,
then heavier.
A slow unfurling,
like melting in spring
revealing green beneath the snow.
A deeper breath,
a stronger step,
a realization.
Not a leap,
but a steady rhythm,
walking forward,
even when the path
feels treacherous.
I never learned the rules about meter or metaphor, or what not to say out loud. I just write what lives inside me: the bruises, the blossoms...