ive realized god has forgiven me
but i struggle to do the same
i reach for the wisdom of solomon
and end up grasping
his sin
my room is quiet
but my soul isnt
silence doesnt mean stillness
ive learned that the hard way
i anguish
what i am learning
to let go of
i am not held
in my own mercy
but i am
held
repentance
is not arrival
its
today
and today
i choose life
even if i whisper it
even if i dont
feel it
yet

i kept the door open
so the past could walk in and tell me again
what i already knew
that the wound was never meant to close
only deepen
with each morning i pretend not to remember
i made myself into a mask
wore it so long it grew nerves
bled when i smiled
and still i wandered
through rooms lit by other people's truths
waiting for someone
who could look straight through me
and not blink
wildness is a kind of prayer
i said mine with teeth
refused to kneel
refused to beg
and still
every silence was a confession
my heart is a ruin that echoes back
only what i refuse to forgive
i love my enemies because they leave me be
but myself
i sharpen against daily
and call it justice
God watches me watch myself
and says nothing
maybe that is the test
i ache
but quietly
i ache
but i smile
i ache
but i function
i ache
and no one claps
but that
is the performance
so no one mistakes it for weakness
the mirror wont meet my eyes
and i dont blame it
those eyes belong to the boy
who never got to look away
who first learned to lie
by telling the truth
too quietly
i am not hollow
i am not empty
i am too full
of everything i had no place to put
and that fullness
does not echo

i dont remember when the rules were written
only that they were written in my bones
etched there like commandments from a god i invented
to keep myself small enough
to fit inside the punishment
i have knelt to every cruelty
some with names i whispered like secrets
some with no names at all
just the echo of my voice
sharpened into command
i dont know how to stop
only how to split
to fracture like glass under holy pressure
to be the mouth that orders and the back that bends
to be the hand raised and the cheek turned
the lash and the mark it leaves
the yes and the why
the silence and the scream
i have been both judge and defendant
executioner and confessor
and still the verdict is always
not enough
never enough
never
i have worn shame and it mixes with my skin
called it modesty
called it devotion
called it what love must look like when it hurts just right
but God doesnt ask for blood the way i do
and i know that
i know it
and still i lay my faith beside my hunger
twisting like lovers caught in a mirror
my mouth half-prayer
half-demand
my hands clasped and trembling
with the weight of worship and war
i have made myself god because no one else would
and hated myself for daring
that is the sin i cannot name
but feel
like fire
just under the surface of my skin

the room does not speak
it doesnt need to
its silence folds me like linen
set aside for mourning
that never quite began
the ghosts are tired of me
or maybe i have stopped
feeding them
this is the dark that asks nothing
not the hunter’s dark
but the hush of snow before it lands
the pause before it knows it's falling
i sit here
shaped but unscripted
an hourglass with no hour
a form memory forgot to fill in
i am empty
yes
but without ache
just
space
what pours in
may be music
or mist
or the bones of a future i havent been asked to carry yet
i do not know what i am to be
but i am what is ready

i was born in the burn
1995 flame, a war within
ghosts pacing the halls before i ever knew
how to carry a name
or lie like a man
i learned young how to build a face
that people could love
so they would never look past it
that mask fit too well
i forgot what skin felt like
my fathers sins were seeds in my blood
planted in silence
harvested in screams behind walls
that cracked before i could fix them
i swore i wouldnt become him
i didnt
i became the fallout
theres a psalm in my right hand
a loaded habit in my left
and every prayer tastes like rust now
i say the right words sometimes
other times i just stare at the ceiling
and wait for the judgment
or the mercy
whichever lands first
i still see her, my friend
ten years gone and somehow
still closer than God some days
i carry her like a debt
that never stops charging interest
my faith is a battlefield
where angels bleed in silence
and demons grin in old familiar faces
mostly mine
twisted mines
i drop my values like broken weapons
pick them up again
pretend theyre clean
pretend im clean
but ive counted the weight of my deeds
on both sides of the scale
and even if it tips my way
i know thats not how grace works
thats just math
and math wont save me
ive stopped praying to be perfect
i just beg to be real
i still want to be holy
but God i dont know how
to stop being me long enough
to let You in
if theres mercy
if theres still blood on the altar for the hypocrite
if grace can bleed this deep
then let it bleed
ive traveled so far to be here again
maybe crawling back is the only kind of worship
ive ever truly known

why do i weep for what i should condemn
why does mercy pull tears from eyes too used to burning
why do i shudder when the hammer falls
on those who once raised it
high
over my own head
why does His kindness undo me
when i am not clean
when i have rehearsed rejection
like a psalm
why do i tremble
when the hand still reaches
jerusalem still stoning the prophets
america still bowing at her own altars
and i
still learning how to love
those who hate
still hoping for beauty
where nothing but dust grows
should i not rejoice when justice is done
and yet
i mourn
i mourn the fire and the ashes
the ruin and the ruiners
as if some echo in me remembers
eden
and how we all fell at once
thorns cannot yield figs
brambles do not feed the hungry
but oh
even the cursed ground drinks rain
so what am i
bitterroot
or beloved
a cracked jar that still catches light
or a shadow wearing grace like borrowed skin
is longing holiness
or just hunger
am i crooked
or just reaching
still
i pray
for the ones who will not pray
and for the One who still waits
in mercy
on the hill we raised to **** His Anointed
the hill where He stays

i dont talk to my friends anymore
the weeds grew fast in the yard
not wildflowers, not beauty
just things that live when you forgot to care
the grass climbs over old footsteps
the porch remembers laughter
i barely recall
now it creaks under my weight like a question
i wont answer
the growth of who I am
crawled over who I was
i cant see him clearly now
just a blur in the mirror
before i brush my teeth
before i remember how much he smiled
without trying
i dont like this change
but i need it
like bitter tea when youre sick
like silence after too much noise
so i sit
in the silent house of myself
curtains drawn, dishes undone
i keep the lights dim
so i wont see the empty places
where people once stood
i dont talk
because so many already left
and the echo of "how are you?"
never lands right anymore
i dont talk
because im tired of answering
tired of explaining
why my laugh feels borrowed
and my eyes always say more than i let my mouth admit
i dont talk
because i dont mind feelings
i just hate the ones i have
they crawl through me like ivy
slow and consuming
theyve made a garden i cant walk through
only sit inside
watching what ive become
grow tall over what i was
and so
i dont talk
not to them
not to you
only to the quiet
only to the weeds