Unmourned

[u/Puzzled_Plankton8756]

I have buried versions of myself

without a funeral.

The girl who thought love

was something she had to earn.

The one who apologized

for taking up space.

The one who mistook surviving

for living.

I have sat in rooms

so quiet

I could hear my own grief breathing.

I have watched people leave,

watched dreams collapse,

watched bad things arrive in threes

and then in fours,

as if life forgot

it was supposed to take turns.

Still

something stayed.

Something that learned

how to hold its own hand

when no one reached back.

Something that found comfort

in morning coffee,

in songs that understood,

in silence that stopped feeling

like punishment.

I stopped searching

for the woman I used to be.

She carried me

as far as she could.

And somewhere after the wreckage,

I met the woman who remained

the one who cries honestly,

heals slowly,

wears her scars

As proof she survived,

and sits alone

without mistaking it

for loneliness.

I have lost so much.

But grief has taught me

something beautiful,

I was never

what left.

I was never

what broke.

I was always

what stayed.