Be Still My Heart

(For You, I Shall Not Name)

I learned your name the way dusk learns the hill,
slowly, in subdued colors, against my will.
No promise was spoken, no hand reached for mine,
yet I watered the dream like a stubborn vine.

I gathered small moments like stones from a shore,
each glance becoming something greater than before.
A smile became sunlight, a kindness became spring,
and silence grew feathers and taught itself to sing.

But you were a horizon, beautiful and far,
a lantern beyond reach, a cold and faithful star.
I walked toward your light through seasons of my own,
only to discover some distances are stone.

So many words bloomed bright and died upon my tongue,
love songs without voices, bells forever unsung.
I carried them carefully, year after year,
a garden of blossoms no one else could hear.

The world kept moving onward, rivers sought the sea,
while time laid silver fingerprints upon me.
Still, some nights I wake and find your ghostly trace,
a memory of warmth that never found a place.

I do not curse your absence, nor mourn what never grew.
The fault was not in me, nor was it ever in you.
Some hearts are meant to wander through fields they cannot claim,
learning how to cherish without possessing flame.

And so I sit with twilight where longing used to start,
watching the first stars gather in the dark.
The wind speaks your name softly, then tears it all apart.

Be still, my heart.

Be still, battered and black and blue.

There was never a home for you.

Penned by my hand on the 23rd of Daedalan, in the year 1007 AF.