Take me back

Take me back to my childhood— when the sun would kiss my face and I believed it loved me back. When laughter lived in the gaps between hours and the sky was something I trusted. Now the sunshine tracks my skin like a memory that lingers too long. I stayed too long. In places, in thoughts, in versions of myself that no longer fit. Take me back to a time when my blood never tasted like wine, when pain didn’t sleep in my bones, when I didn’t write poems just to feel something. My love could fill a sea, wild and open, infinite in its reach. But now— now I can’t even feel the breeze. Like the wind has forgotten my name, like the earth doesn’t know I’m still here. And it hurts. It hurts when I think about the days I whispered strength to my reflection. The days I told myself, "Just one more sunrise, just one more breath." I put my hand over the fire not to burn, but to see if I can still cry. And that’s when I realize: I hate it when I’m by myself. Not for the silence— but for the way it makes my thoughts louder. It’s okay for me to scream. To scream, not for attention, but for release. To say I’m still here, even when it feels like no one’s listening. Because somewhere in that scream, in that echo I send into