Saving

I cannot save people. I cannot save you.

I want to—desperately—but I cannot.

I hear the sorrow, the weight of it pressing against the walls of my chest, the echoes of pain, the quiet surrender of hope, and it tears through me as if it is my own. Wave after wave of why and what if crash against my ribs, pulling me under.

I was not born brave. Courage was not stitched into my bones at birth.

But I waded through the murky waters of this world, I stumbled, fought, and found my footing.

And in that struggle, I earned the fire—the resolve to stand for what is right, to never bow, to fight with my last breath.

So, I do not brace for the worst.

Why live in the shadow of ruin when light still touches the earth?

Why duel with fate when it can be embraced as a gift?

Why let sorrow be the only song when beauty still hums in the wind?

How good can it get, I scream. Show me how incredible life still is, even as the pain of the past is silently stitched up inside of me.

And why?

That fear never saved me, it was an illusion of safety, a shield of predictability, woven from familiar pain. But I survived—on my own. No mechanism or planning lessened the blow. The heartache and searing wounds still ripped through my fragile soul.

But still your heart aches—not because your life was hard, but because you bore it with such grace, such tenderness. and still, you hold yourself back.

The ache is for the loss now.

You refuse to fly, because your wings have been broken and nearly destroyed. But it does not always have to end the same way.

You are the author.

You choose the endings. Some will be sorrowful. Some will be everything you ever dreamed.

The sky will still cast a gray haze on your saddest days but there will always be a glimpse of the sun that’s shines through as your tear slips down your cheek.

I want to see you soar, to feel the wind rise beneath you, to unravel each other thread by thread, to let go of the fear. I want the light of all that I have found in my own unraveling shine on your darkness. To illuminate a more worthwhile path.

But I can’t. And I don’t know which pain will sit with me the longest.

Will it feel like I am dragging you beside me, reaching for something just out of grasp?

Or can you walk beside me in the light?

Are the shadows always going to call you back?