This anonymous heart

I know when the golden evening light
spills through the cherry trees
enchanting the soul that stops to notice.

I know which window
holds the sunset longest,

where the weeds grow flowers
painting forgotten fields with color,

and which puddle keeps the moon
long after the others have gone dark.

Once I would have shown you.
I would have called your name
and asked you to walk beside me.

I would have pointed
and shared the wonder.

I know better now.

Some people look at a wildflower
and see a weed.

Some hear a bird in the quiet
and complain of the noise.

Some can stand beneath a sky
draped in silver lights
and never look up.

Once I showed you my world
and you scoffed.

So, I have become careful.

Not because the flower needs defending,
or the moon can be wounded,

but because once I have shown you
where I keep something beautiful,

your voice may follow me there.

A careless word
can live a very long time
inside a lovely place.

I keep certain sunsets to myself.

I pass the little flowers
without calling anyone over.

When the light finds some forgotten corner
and makes it sacred for a moment,

I stand there alone.

Let the world think
there was nothing there.

Let them walk past.

There are beautiful things
that survive because no one notices them.

And there are beautiful things
I will not risk
by asking you to see.

So, I keep them.

Not hidden,
not guarded,
just mine to notice.

We stand side by side
On ground that feels complete
Almost close enough to touch
But somehow, we never quite meet

You think this is what closeness feels like
Easy, quiet, undisturbed
Like nothing is broken
Because nothing is ever heard

But you don’t see the valley between us
How it opened slowly over time
A journey of a thousand miles
Hidden in the space between your heart and mine

I tried, in the beginning
More than I knew how to say
I crossed pieces of that distance alone
Hoping you would meet me along the way

I waited for you to notice
To turn, to step, to try
But you stood where it was comfortable
While I kept walking, wondering why

And somewhere along that journey
I grew tired of calling your name
Tired of hoping you would hear me
Tired of carrying the weight of us the same

So I stopped

Not all at once
But quietly, the way distance grows
I learned how to stand beside you
Without expecting to be close

Now you see peace where I feel absence
You see fine where I have gone still
You do not hear the silence in me
Because it never felt real

Could you cross the distance between us
Perhaps
If you ever felt it there

I will not walk the road between us
But I have not turned away
I am somewhere along the distance now
Waiting, without asking you to stay

I see the smile you use
to keep the world away,
a careful mask you’ve learned to wear.
But deep behind your eyes,
a storm gathers, heavy and restless,
waiting to break.

I see the pain you hide,
how it seeps through the surface,
quiet cracks no one else seems to notice.

I want to reach for you,
but my hands hesitate
in the space between us.
I want to speak,
but it stays there, unsaid.

So I sit beside you in silence,
where my presence is the only language I know.
I listen as your sorrow spills over,
soft and endless like rain.

I walk beside you,
lifting what I can of your unseen weight,
even as it settles into my soul.

I feel your pain as if it were my own,
not borrowed but shared,
until it grows too heavy inside my chest.

I say nothing.
But still I stay.

And in the quiet,
I hope you can feel it,
this unspoken care,
this silent kind of love
that does not know how to hold,
but never leaves.

She was a dreamer,
the kind who lingered
when others rushed;
saw possibility in ordinary moments,
beauty where others passed it by.

She shared it carefully,
wanting him to see what she saw,
to see her.

His words weren’t loud.

Not meant to destroy.

But they cut her down.

Once.
Then again.
And again.

Slowly, dreaming felt unfamiliar.
Like wearing a name
that no longer fit.
Like looking in the mirror
and not recognizing the reflection.

She wondered when hope learned
how to break so quietly,
as she swept pieces of herself
off the floor.

She still sees beautiful things.
She still harbors small dreams.
But she keeps that part of herself
carefully locked away.

Stumbling through fog so thick
Vision warped, senses dulled

Trudging through quicksand
Each step heavier than the last

Battling to move forward
The more I struggle, the faster I sink

Rain falling without source or cause
Seeping through skin and bone

No light at the end of the tunnel
No hint of dawn breaking

Just endless darkness
Cold rain
Clinging quicksand
And fog that never lifts

I was born a dreamer,
seeing the world through sunlit glass,
believing in knights who slay dragons,
in comrades who fight back to back,
in friends who keep secrets like coins in a palm,
in someone who sees beauty the way I do.

But life leaned close and whispered loss,
its breath a weight on my chest.
The light grew thin—
and I slipped into a well of silence.

I waited for rescue:
a brave knight,
a steadfast comrade,
a loyal friend.
But the world moved past,
its footsteps fading like rain.

Then came the choice:
sink, or climb.

So, hand over hand,
I learned the rough rhythm of stone,
found music in the scrape and strain.
I learned to face dragons,
to keep my own counsel,
to make beauty that no one names.

Now I stand at the rim,
palms scarred,
heart steady,
sunlight spilling through the storm.
No wind beneath me—
but still, I fly.

She was born with a heart of glass—
clear, beautiful, breakable.
Even as a child, she knew
the danger of being seen through.
So she smiled politely,
spoke gently,
and built distance like a moat
around a castle of solitude.

She learned to keep her secrets
like treasure in a box—
safe, quiet, unseen.
Her laughter was light,
her expression unchanging.
No one saw the emotion beneath,
surging like a restless tide.

But one day, loneliness whispered louder
than caution’s voice.
She wanted warmth,
wanted to feel the press of friendship close.
So she cracked open the door,
let the light spill in,
and let them inside.

One by one, they cracked the glass.
The first, with envy’s ink,
wrote her story in a book—
her pain made into poetry
for others to read.
The second whispered her secrets
to hungry ears,
turning trust into gossip.
And the third—oh, the cruelest—
took her soul’s bare words
and stabbed her with a knife,
then left her
shattered and alone.

She gathered the pieces,
bloody-handed, trembling,
and built her walls
a mile high
and ten feet deep.
Now she hides her heart behind them,
her face a well-crafted mask—
gentle, agreeable, kind,
unchanging.

Her heart still beats,
but faintly,
echoing through crystal fractures.
She listens, she nods,
she never disagrees.
The world thinks her calm,
unbreakable, strong—
but she knows the truth:
if ever she let someone close again,
if ever she dared to love or trust,
her heart of glass
would finally shatter
into dust.

Moonlight held her,
the sea unending.
Her boat rocked softly,
with the ripple of water.

She was grateful for the breeze,
the quiet night

She remembered days of fire,
the sun scorching her skin.
Days of fury,
waves that wanted
to crush her.

Time melted;
hours into days,
days into years,
until even time
was lost.

Yet a shadow of a place remained,
Hidden in the deepest corners of her mind:
Solid earth beneath her feet,
Fields golden in the sun,
Air fragrant with freshly baked bread
and sweet jasmine blossoms,
Voices bright with laughter,
A hearth that glowed with warmth,
Arms that sheltered her in safety,
A love that asked nothing
in return.

She desperately clung
to this image,
perhaps only a dream.

But just in case,
she picked up the oars
and rowed.

I thrash in the restless tide,
the surface slipping farther from my grasp.
My breath scatters into bubbles,
and the sea folds me into its silence.

Through a wavering veil of liquid glass,
I glimpse you,
a figure bent and trembling with the current,
your hand stretching toward me.

Hope flickers like a fragile flame underwater.
I rise, desperate for its light.

But when I break the surface,
my heart splinters into shards
for you do not lift me from the deep.
Instead, you lay your burdens in my arms,
stones that drag me under.

Unseeing, you leave me
to sink with my extinguished hope.