Dear boy
I wore your name like a love locket
close to my heartbeat -
golden, sacred, eternal.
But time has cruel hands.
It turned every memory of you
into a fragile souvenir
that breaks each time I touch it.
You once said,
“Love is magic.”
And I believed you
the way children believe stars
follow them home.
But magic, I learned,
always asks for something in return.
And the price of loving you
was pieces of myself
I could no longer afford to lose.
Now sometimes
I just want to close my eyes
and return to the version of me
that still carried wonder in her pockets
the child-hearted soul
who loved without fear
and trusted without counting scars.
I wish someone would hold my shaking thoughts
and whisper softly:
“You will rise beyond the weight
they tried to place on your shoulders.
You are beautiful
in every shape your soul survives in.
Do not let people
who are strangers to self-love
teach you what love should feel like.
Because control is not devotion.
Possession is not protection.
And needing you
is not the same as loving you.”
And somewhere between
my forever
and your temporary,
“we” disappeared.
When did 'us' became only 'me'?
Maybe It was from the first...until I realised the player was only u...and not me..