Letters Poured Neat

I do not complain loudly.

My anguish escapes instead in the silence—

like bubbles rising from the depths below.

For sometimes I feel as though I am drowning.

My foundation was condemned.

My walls— my whole life's structure—

must be broken first before I am allowed to grow.

And as each wall comes crashing down, I find myself clinging—

clutching desperately at my heart, trying to hold it steady.

I whisper to it:

You'll be okay.

This is necessary.

Even though I do not really know if that's true.

It frightens me to watch rooms of my life disappear. Old structure giving way

To see pieces of myself reduced to splinters and ash.

The rot must go.

What is broken cannot remain.

Not because it is worthless—

but because something sacred remains.

Worthy of preservation

Though it feels as if so much of me has been left behind,

trust this:

The walls are not the house.

And when the dust settles,

To breathe you in is the oldest hunger I know.

Not to possess you. Never that.

Only to arrive beside you after the long abrasion of the world and feel your warmth undo me inch by inch.

I think love must be this:

not the fever people speak of nor the sharpness of longing alone,

but the moment someone finally loosens the armor they forgot they were wearing.

The slow exhale.

The unclenching.

The quiet confession of weight leaving the body.

You once asked me what if I saw all of you and found nothing divine there.

What if I reached the final page and thought: that’s it?

But darling,

I do not love you for spectacle.

I love the sound of your breathing when you finally fall asleep.

I love the way your voice softens when you stop preparing yourself for disappointment.

I love the moments you forget to be guarded.

And maybe that is my truest confession:

more than kisses, more than touch, more than all the frantic hungers people mistake for love—

I want to hear you say you feel safe with me.

Safe enough to let go.

Safe enough to rest.

Because if someday the world tears the skin from both our hands and leaves us with nothing but a tiny apartment, cheap coffee, exhaustion, and each other—

I think I would still call myself lucky.

No—

more than lucky.

Victorious.

For what is love if not finding one soul capable of washing the noise of the world from yours?

What is love if not returning home and feeling your spirit come back to life in the presence of another?

So come here.

Lay your head against my chest.

Let the day leave you slowly.

The world can wait a little longer.

Ivory: Tell me a story.

Ember: There once was a man and his partner. Though they chose one another, he was lonely.

Ivory: Why?

Ember: Because every room he entered, he wondered if it would be lighter once he left.

Ivory: Was he truly a burden?

Ember: Some would say yes. Some would say no. Both would be right.

Ivory: What happened next?

Ember: He grew afraid.

Ivory: Of what?

Ember: That his storms would become someone else's flood. So he carried them alone.

Ivory: Then he drowned?

Ember: No yet He was drowning.

Ivory: That sounds like the same thing.

Ember: Only to those watching from shore.

Ivory: Then this is a sad tale?

Ember: No. The sea raged. The storms gathered. And still he endured.

Ivory: So he conquered the ocean?

Ember: No, my dear. He swallowed salt. He lost ground. He thought often of surrender.

Ivory: Then why does the story matter?

Ember: Because he stayed. Many never discover the measure of their own will until everything asks them to quit.

Ivory: I know this story.

Ember: Do you?

Ivory: The Raven

*Pause*

Ember: yes

Ivory: The one who rises after the struggle

Ember: Yes.

Ivory: Valravyn.

Ember: Yes.

Ivory: The Raven of the Slain.

I have come to love the ascent. Others curse it as necessary suffering—

but I have learned the climb itself contains joy.

But has suffering become such a common feeling  I seek it?

No.

But I've come to learn Suffering itself is not the villain Suffering without reason is. But that's not the case here. As I climb the mountain Wheels navigating rocks, twists, roots

All which, Existed long before my ascent I dare not disturb them, for this is their home And I am but a guest

Its during those moments I trust the strength I've gained:

Once I gasped for air upon the mountain. Now I gasp away from it —

Lungs desperate for cedar, juniper the cold earthy breath of the trail.

To breathe as if it's my first time breathing.

As if the air itself was laced with freedom; juniper, dust, and cold iron.

And here

I find rest again.

I once cursed the rain, the loss of the sun's warmth.

Yet even then, life was quietly growing where I thought nothing could.

Strange—

the tears I once wished away taught me gentleness.

And when another hurting heart found its way to mine,

I do not want to hear you say “I love you.”

Some words lose their shape after passing from mouth to mouth.

I can no longer trust that sound.

Spoken too quickly. As if they cost nothing to say.

I want to feel it instead.

I want to know it instinctively.

I want to hold you close, and watch your body forget its fear.

I want to feel you lean into me without hesitation.

I want you to look into my eyes and say instead:

“I trust you.” “This is where I rest.” “This is home.”

I want to witness the moment your shoulders finally loosen, like they no longer need to carry vigilance.

To see your jaw soften. Your hands uncurl.

Unbuckling your armor with trembling hands, metal striking the floor one piece at a time.

Just long enough to stop bracing against the world.

Just long enough for your breathing to stop sounding like survival.

Outside, the storm can keep raging.

Life can keep sharpening its knives against us again and again.

But here—

here, for a moment—

we do not have to survive anything.

We can simply rest.

And maybe maybe this is how I say:

Do you love me? she asked— her voice trembling between fear and hope.

I paused, the way she once did, eyes lifted to the sky as if it might answer for me.

How do you measure what refuses to be held?

Like the smell of rain on concrete— not sought, but welcomed.

Like the ocean breeze cutting through desert heat— uninvited, but welcomed.

Like the quiet between missions— when I finally breathe and think of you.

And like them—

I do love you.

But even then…

not the way the world insists it should be, without the hunger they mistake for proof.

I don’t need to possess it to feel it.

“Hypothetically… would you marry me?”

You tilted your head toward the night sky— as if asking the stars how truth should sound.

“My answer isn’t no,” you whispered.

“Just… not yet.”

“If the world were different— when this line between us fades— we’ll find each other again.”

And I believed you.

The way sailors believe in distant lights they may never reach.

So I take your promise the way one receives starlight—

gently,

without grasping.

I signed your closure letter:

—From the boy who still thinks of you when the sky gets too quiet.

I was told writing it would dull the ache.

But seasons have come and gone, and your absence still commands gravity.

Our time was brief. Careful. Restrained.

And still I am not who I was.

There was no grand moment.

No sweeping confession.

Just your smile when you saw me. Your quiet laugh, half-hidden behind your hand. The way we lingered over nothing at all.

You treasured the gift I made you. You whispered for me not to leave even when we both needed sleep.

The pauses when our eyes met. The way we lingered a second longer than we meant to.

You promised a blessing. A chance—

when timing and structure align.

They tell me to let go. That I’ve waited too long for a maybe.

And

Maybe they’re right.

But still—

Why does your seal brand skin I cannot shed?

others were given a visitor’s pass, an invitation for a season. But this? This was a promise of residence.

They come and go. Autumn's warmth. Winter's departure.

And yet my hand knows the handle that will not turn for me.

Your soft, “Not no. Just not now.”

Mercy. Exile.

It presses against bone, equal parts blessing and blade.

While light moves freely in your halls— I sit outside.

But steadier still:

I do not want borrowed seasons.

I want the whole climate. I want to return home.

So I wait— not emptied, but becoming.

Why is it—

when I pause, lungs heavy, chest wide—

I swear I can drink you in, though your scent has never touched my throat?

My skin knows you already.

How?

As if memory were planted there, seeded by some life before this one—

though we have never touched.

And still, the mere shadow of you erupts gooseflesh across my arms, every inch aching toward the gravity of your body.

How cruel is this trick?

A thought alone can summon what presence never gave.

It is not love.

It is something older.

That your absence commands me more than any presence ever has.

A single glance—

and something inside me kneels before I do.

As if in every life I have reached your shore—

What happens later doesn’t invalidate what was real.

And what was real does not obligate the future

It is possible to love with nothing out of place, and still be limited by time.

Questions will circle— let them drift.

Blame knocks, and is met with silence.

No explanation is required. No faults tallied.

Be grateful for the gift we shared— the memories, now marked sacred

And know— the door is closed for now, not as an ending, but as a pause that keeps its meaning.

I speak with the dead, Not as mouths that move or lungs that breathe, but their memories, their thoughts— The questions that cost them years, the thoughts that broke sleep.

It startles me how few are hungry for this kind of depth, That though now offered to the world entire, passed like unopened doors, offering minds worn thin by thought, while brighter things promise comfort without cost.

Love, to me, was rest.

Not the absence of effort, but the place effort could finally end.

A harbor where armor came off, where the weight of the day was met with hands that said: You can set it down now.

I didn’t come to you empty to take. I came to be filled back up— to remember why the labor was worth it.

Touch was not noise to me. It was quiet.

Cuddling, a breath slowing. Holding hands, a compass returning north. My thumb brushing your cheek— a way of saying I’m here. We’re safe.

But for you, love lived differently.

It required energy. Attention. Presence pulled from an already-full ledger.

Tenderness was another task. Affection, another switch to flip after a day of being “on.” And when the power ran low, love was the first thing set aside.

So when I reached for rest, I met refusal.

And that was the wound.

Not fatigue. Not silence. But seeking shelter and finding the door closed.

Each time I needed recharge, the rejection drained what little remained. I learned that my reaching cost more than it restored.

We could have survived. Years, maybe. Attracted. Compatible. Kind.

But survival is not rest. And love should not be another thing that exhausts you.

I caught a glimpse— of something radiant resting within its shell.

And in that moment, I understood something sacred:

To force it open would not reveal its beauty. only risk fracturing what keeps it whole.

For the shell is not a prison. It is protection: Intentional, Earned, Beautiful in its own right.

Its curves catch the light. Its surface carries the quiet marks of endurance, of choosing safety over spectacle.

I do not press. I do not test the strength of something precious just to satisfy my wonder.

Instead— I cherish the glimpses when they are offered. Brief flashes of brilliance felt as grace, not triumph.

And when it chooses silence, when even its glow is hidden—

I stay.

Let me simply remain close. Let me sit beside this beauty, resting in its presence when sight is denied.

For I have never known anything that radiated like this: Not loudly. Not all at once. But steadily.

And if preserving it cost patience— if devotion means waiting an eternity for only moments of light—

then I will wait. Gladly.

My dear, If I could... I would... reach into the hidden chambers of your heart, where the light trembles, where the raw, quiet places throb unseen.

But sadly... flesh cannot mend what lies beneath.

Still, my spirit knows the path to you. Let it brush against the wounds my hands can never touch... as if laying warm palms upon the altar of your heart.

Let it move like breath through the broken spaces, seeping into your fault lines... like water finding its passage through stone, loosening the sorrow caught there.

Let me meet you in the stillness where spirits kneel. A soft hum rising through your hollow places.

May you feel held as though by something ancient and tender, older and stronger than your pain.

And if the cost of that moment were damnation, I would step into the furnace unblinking, bearing the memory of you like forbidden heaven smoldering beneath my ribs.

Let the devils riot— I would greet every flame with a steady smile, for I have held in my hands what they were never fashioned to understand.

And if the world cries out that I have bent my knees to a phantom— let it. They have never felt how a single heartbeat can remake the architecture of the soul, how one spark can redraw the constellations inside a life.