pearl dock
I come when no one is watching,
When the lights are still on,
and you tell the room
you’re just tired.
That’s when I sit beside you.
I touch nothing,
but everything breaks a little
when I’m near.
I watch you fold yourself smaller
with every breath,
just so the pain
has room to stay.
I do not scream,
I never had to.
You echo loud enough for both of us.
I do not enter through doors,
I grow,
in forgotten calls,
in photos you hide but never delete,
in the way music
stops meaning anything
but still plays.
I sit in your throat
when you say I’m okay
without knowing what the word even means.
I am in the eyes
that don’t meet yours anymore,
in the message that says seen,
in the voice that harshens
when it says your name
like it’s already letting go.
I slip into routines,
become the pause between footsteps,
the reason your body moves
but your mind stays behind.
I am not darkness,
I am the cold that stays
even after the sun returns.
I am not a storm,
I am what comes after,
the stillness that makes you realize
nothing is left.
I hollow you quietly,
removing joy
like threads from fabric,
until you forget
what warmth used to feel like
against your ribs.
I let you breathe,
but only enough
to remember
what it meant to feel full.
I teach you how to live quietly
so no one hears the breaking,
how to cry without sound,
how to miss someone
without telling a soul
because you know
they stopped counting.
I hold the version of you
that no one else sees,
the one who doesn’t know
how to be held
without apologizing for it.
I feed the parts of you
that believe you are too much
to be loved fully,
and not enough
to be kept.
I watch you scroll through old messages
like scripture,
as if rereading the pain
might make it hurt less this time.
I am the ache
when someone asks if you’re happy
and you lie so well
you almost believe it.
steady widget
faint raven
radiant terrace
shut crypt