there is a silence after betrayal
that is louder than any scream
it is the empty room where trust once lived
now hollowed out by absence and doubt

she was the keeper of my fragments
the one who traced the jagged edges of my soul
and yet in the quiet turning away
she dismantled the sanctuary i thought we built

not with a shout but with stillness
not with rage but with retreat
a slow unweaving of everything that was sacred
like a thread pulled loose from a tapestry of us

i search for the moments that cracked
the fault lines invisible until collapse
wondering how love became a fracture
how faith became a ghost

and in that void, i confront the unbearable truth
that sometimes the deepest wounds are inflicted
not by the obvious blows
but by the hands that promised to heal

this pain is a dark ocean
vast and unknowable
where memories drift like wreckage
and the weight of what was lost
pulls me beneath the surface

yet even beneath this crushing tide
there is a flicker
a stubborn pulse
a fierce quiet that refuses to drown

for betrayal is not the end of me
it is the harsh crucible
through which i am forged anew
scarred, yes, but unbroken
still standing
still breathing
still reaching for light
in the ruins of what was

the quiet sting of betrayal lingers
like a shadow cast long after the light has gone
she was the one who knew my edges
the corners i never showed the world
and yet, in silence, she turned away
not just from me, but from the pain that bound us both

to be abandoned when your world fractures
is a wound carved not by accident but by choice
the promises once whispered
now echo as hollow ghosts
and the absence — louder than any word
breaks the fragile trust i tried to hold tight

how do you reconcile love
when it becomes a mirror reflecting loss?
when the one who said “i’m here”
never crosses the threshold
to stand with you in your darkest hours?

there’s a weight in being left behind
not just physically but spiritually
like a tether cut
like a story rewritten without your voice
and yet, from this shattered ground
i gather the fragments of myself
learning that betrayal
though brutal
cannot define the whole of me

they say your bad outweighs your good
as if love were a ledger
as if truth could be tallied
on scales built by the blind
they count your cracks
but not the light leaking through
they trace your edges
but never the hands you held out
even when yours were empty

they slept in your arms
but never knew your soul
let your body in
but locked their wounds behind walls
you were never meant to climb
you asked for honesty
they gave avoidance
you brought presence
they brought projection
you offered depth
they feared drowning

you weren’t too much
they were too hollow
to hold what was real

because they saw you only
through the broken mirror of themselves
fragmented love
shattered vision
the kind of closeness
that touches skin
but never spirit

they fell short
in the places you overflowed
in courage, in clarity
in the willingness to grow
even when it hurt
they mistook your fire for chaos
because their own flames
had long since gone cold

but you
you stayed
you tried
you held space
for a heart that never held you back

you showed up
again and again
with hands full of truth
and a voice that trembled
only when you chose to speak gently

let them say what they will
let them measure you in shadows
you are not for those
who weigh worth
by the moments they misunderstood.
you are not defined
by the ones who could only touch you
but never hold you whole

you are for the ones
who see the mosaic
not the mess
who know that broken
doesn’t mean bad
and that love
was never meant
to be earned like a grade
but received like a sunrise
after the longest night

and when they say
your bad outweighed your good
smile

they never knew the difference
between a storm
and a cleansing
but you do
and you are already clean

there is a peace in solitude
that no crowded room can give
a silence that doesn’t ask questions
a calm that lets me live

i move through my day untouched
unjudged
unexplained
i rise when i rise
i heal without shame

no tug-of-war between who i am
and who they want me to be
no need to shrink for comfort
no mirror distorting me

and yet
beneath the quiet
there’s a pulse i didn’t plant
a hunger not from loneliness
but something older
blunt
blunt and honest as a heartbeat
thudding in the dark
the ache of skin that still remembers
what it felt like to be held

it’s not desperation
it’s design
biology still hums a song
my soul no longer sings
and some nights i almost forget
how much it cost
to crave the wrong hands
and call it love

but i remember

i remember the contortions
the self-abandonment
the thousand compromises made
just to feel warm
for a moment too brief
to be worth the aftermath

so i breathe
i sit with the ache
without feeding it lies
i remind my body
We are safe now

not untouched
but whole

and if love comes again
it must match the peace
i fought so long to claim
it must add to the silence
not shatter it

until then
i kiss my own shoulders
i wrap myself in rest
i turn longing into a language
that speaks to the stars
instead of empty arms

this is how i overcome
not by killing the craving
but by teaching it patience
by tending the garden within
so thoroughly
that nothing external
feels like survival

solitude, after all
isn’t absence
it is presence
pure and full

and when the right love comes
it will not compete with that
it will bow to it
or pass

they said
“i’m here if you need.”
but vanished when i did
offered words like warm bandages
then recoiled
from the sight of real blood

support that looked good in text
but never made it past the screen
a love that echoed like a voicemail
never quite reaching me
when it mattered most

they ask “how are you?”
but not to hear the truth
just enough to feel kind
just enough to keep the mask in place
if you answer honestly
they flinch

and that’s the toll

you start doubting your own need
you quiet the cry before it rises
you rehearse being “fine”
like it’s a second language
you were forced to learn to survive

you begin to shrink
to carry your collapse alone
because every time you tried to share it
someone called it too heavy
and walked away lighter

but here’s what no one tells you
you’re allowed to stop explaining
you’re allowed to stop knocking
on doors that never open

there is no healing in begging
for crumbs of connection
from those who feast on your silence

so you begin again
with yourself

you become the ear you never had
the shoulder that never vanished
you learn to recognize
the difference between
presence and performance

you build small sanctuaries
a journal that listens
without judgment
a walk in the trees
that doesn’t require words

and maybe
just maybe
you find one or two souls
who show up
when it’s not convenient
who sit beside your storm
without trying to fix the weather

this is how you leave
not in anger
but in clarity

you stop pouring light
into hands full of holes
you let the fake fall away
you save the softness for those
who know how to hold it

and most of all
you come home to yourself
because the most sacred kind of support
is the kind that never leaves
when everyone else does

the world has grown thick-skinned to the cries that don’t trend
to the girl sleeping cold, to the boy with no friend
It scrolls past the sorrow if the filter’s not right
then gasps in confusion when it feels the night

it hears the gunshots through headlines and static
then turns up the music, calls grief too dramatic
it mocks the worn silence of those torn apart
then begs for soft shoulders when it breaks its heart

it calls others "too much" for their wounds left exposed
yet pleads for compassion when its own doors are closed
it shrugs off the weeping of war battered lands
but shakes when the storm touches its own hands

numb to the mothers who bury their sons
the prayers left unanswered, the damage long done
but when its light dims, when its sky goes grey
suddenly pain deserves more than a day

suddenly, tears mean something profound
suddenly, silence should echo with sound
suddenly, justice feels urgent and new
but only when pain knocks on its view

it’s easy to watch when the flames aren’t your own
to call someone bitter when you’ve never known
what it’s like to scream and be met with a wall
to fall in the dark with no one to call

so spare me the outrage when your wounds appear
we’ve lived lifetimes ignored, voiceless and clear
we are the sirens you silenced for years
now watching you tremble through your first tears

maybe now you will understand
why we never reached out to an unfeeling hand
why we learned to carry our pain in disguise
because the world only listens when it cries

you gave
not just effort
but essence
you handed people pieces of yourself
that you couldn’t get back
because you thought
maybe this time
they’d see you

but they didn’t
they labeled what they didn’t understand
they twisted your depth into drama
your honesty into attack
your stillness into detachment
they took your light
then called you cold
when you asked for warmth in return

you kept thinking
if you just explained better
loved louder
softened more
they’d meet you halfway

but they were never walking toward you
they were standing still
expecting you to loop back
into what you’d already healed from
just to make them comfortable

and still
you stayed longer than you should’ve
you shrank when you knew better
you hoped against your own knowing

because you remembered who they could be
not who they showed you they were

you called it loyalty
but it was grief in disguise
grief that they would never choose to rise

you thought age would bring clarity
that experience would mean better choices
but no one tells you
that wisdom doesn’t stop the ache
it just makes it louder when you ignore it

you knew better
and that’s what hurts the most

you didn’t fall blindly
you walked back into the fire
eyes wide open
hoping maybe this time
you wouldn’t burn

but you did
and the pain isn’t just from them
it’s from you
from betraying your own evolution
for a connection that couldn’t hold
the weight of who you’ve become

it’s okay
this is part of it too
the slip
the return
the sacred loop
that shows you, again
how far you've come
by how far you no longer fit

you’re not cold
you’re not broken
you’re just done trying to be chosen
by people who only understand love
when it comes in the shape of their own wounds

grieve it
then leave it
not with anger
but with knowing

you outgrew them
long before they let go
you just needed one last reminder
of how small the cage really was

and now
you’re free again