Shelf Two - Poems

Echo

The echo of pain.
The echo of pleasure.
Not long ago, the echo of memory stopped by for a visit.

Each night, it whispers—the horror of a moment,
the untold pain I could never share.

Just the echo.
The sensation.
The shame.
The guilt.

The echo… the frequency of embarrassment.

Echo—stop visiting me.
You are no longer welcome here.

Even if the residue of your vibration remains nestled in memory,
I drain you of power.
I strip your sound.
I take back the silence.

Echo…
let your last visit
seep away
as I say,
Good night.

Veil

What you’ve worn to survive.

Let’s start at thirteen—
when you decided you were grown.
When you became you.
The version of you that would make mistakes,
that cried quietly
because you didn’t know what you were doing,
and still walked headfirst into it all.

What captured you?
What blinded you?

The veil.
The veil of innocence.
The veil of unreason.

And now—look at you.
Pitiful? Maybe.
But still standing.
That veil still flutters in your face,
and even knowing it’s there,
you wear it like armor.

Why?
How come?

The veil of survival.
The thread that binds past, present,
and perhaps a future—
a future already outlined,
because the veil has a path.

But when—
when will you remove it?

When will you be seen
for who you’ve become,
not who you were?

We’re ready.

Lift the veil.

Ritual

I hate you.
I can’t stand you.
I envy you.

It’s not that you’re the villain—
it’s that you matter so much.
And I can never seem to visit you.

Ritual,
you mean everything to others,
and to me?
I could care less.

Ugh.
You make me want to throw up.
You’re overrated.

I don’t mean your boring, mundane presence.
I mean the way you creep into people’s lives
like you belong there.
You’re a parasite.

A fraud dressed as purpose.

You don’t always belong.
And just saying your name?
Gets on my nerves.

I hate you.
I really do.

Please step aside.

Ha! 

After the Distance

There comes a day
when the running exhausts itself.

Not the dramatic kind—
no thunder,
no declarations.

Just a quiet pause
in the middle of an ordinary moment
when something inside you says,

Enough.

You look around
and realize the distance you traveled
was never measured in miles.

It was measured
in the ways you tried to forget yourself.

The silence.
The swallowed words.
The doors you closed
so carefully
no one would hear the lock.

And yet—

some small part of you
kept the light on.

Not brightly.
Just enough.

Enough for a tired soul
to recognize the doorway
when it finally appeared again.

The Gap Between Breaths

In time, you will learn.

In time, you will grow.

In time, challenges will arise.

In time, life may feel cynical.

But it is the gap between breaths where a million moments live—untouched, unnoticed.

We can’t always see it, can’t always focus.

But the gap is where everything happens.

Too many pauses suffocate us.

We are not ruled by time.

Time exists because of us 

What Is Love?

What does love feel like? What is love?
Why does it seek me?
Am I worthy?

Is love as soft as a feather?
Is it an embrace?
Why is love so complex—yet powerful enough to erase anything?

Love is a pulse. A beat.
Love is a tear.
Love is flow.
It’s a reflection caught in time.
It’s the wind—blowing ancient wisdom to your ears.

Just listen.
You’ll find it.
It’s everywhere.

Burden

I once heard a preacher say,
“Burdens are like shopping bags you carry—even when you’re running.”
And somehow,
we keep carrying them.

They slow us down, but we hold on tight.
Why?
What makes burden so attractive to shop for?
Why do we reach for more
when we’re already holding too much?

Burdens fit all of us—
custom-tailored like they belong.
Is it a badge?
A quiet badge of honor?
Proof we’ve endured,
proof we’ve lived?

We wear them so well,
we even show them off.
We share them in conversation like souvenirs from pain.

But the truth?
The definition of burden is simple—
a heavy load.
It doesn’t say good or bad.
It just says heavy.

And too much of anything…
Well—
you already know.

So why not put the bags down?
Why not see what you’re like
when your hands are free?

Threshold

The door was larger than I could have imagined.
I didn’t dare step foot to the other side.
In fact, I tried—
with all my might—
to close it.

I didn’t want to see beyond it.
I didn’t care to know the future.
I once heard that life energy is lost when we seek too much of what’s to come.
So I refused to know.
I stayed still.

But years passed.
And I longed to jump through it.
That once-terrifying door?
Now looked like a promise.

I learned—
it’s okay to open the door.
It’s okay to discover new worlds.
To expand.
To evolve.

Because stepping into something new has its rewards.
You only need to believe
that the threshold itself
is the reward.

Don’t mistake the threshold for punishment.
It’s not.
It is the intersection of experience and opportunity.
It’s the sacred moment where you prove to life—
“I’ve grown. I understand. I’m ready.”

So next time you find yourself at the edge,
don’t hesitate.
Step in.
Leap.
That is your prize.

Victory, in its purest form.

What if it doesn’t matter?
What if the weight you carry is a ghost,
and the finish line was never the point?

What if it’s nothing?
Not a prize, not a title, not a spotlight—
just the silence between heartbeats.

What if it’s empty?
And in that emptiness,
you finally hear your own voice.

What if where you are is the living?
Not someday. Not elsewhere.
But this breath. This moment. This step.

What if it’s all about the journey?
The becoming, the breaking, the blooming—
the sacred, stumbling walk home to yourself.

What if your feeling is the language?
What if presence is the poem?
What if just being in it—without needing to share it—is the sacred act?

Fragment

There will be no more scattered fragments in your life.
That time has come to an end.

Did you not know?
You were the prize.
Those tiny shards of glass,
that once pinched and poked at your soul—
they are taken.
They have been stored away,
never to inconvenience you again.

The fragments—
those pieces of incompleteness—
are now paired with others,
to complete the masterpiece.

Fragments were just reminders,
reminders of unfinished business.
But now?
Those pieces will collect,
and one day—
you’ll see the whole picture.