A Part Of Me Reaches

I push people away,

before they decide if I’m worth holding onto.

Before they get too close, before I give them the map to all my soft places.

I push them away before their silence starts to feel like rejection.

Before their warmth starts to scare me.

Before I care too much about a presence I can’t control.

Mostly,

because I’ve grown used to the quiet.

Because solitude doesn’t leave in the middle of the night.

Solitude doesn’t ask questions, doesn’t press its weight into me,

when I’m already carrying too much.

Alone, I’ve learned to breathe without bracing.

I’ve learned to fold laundry to music,

to eat dinner by candlelight without calling it lonely.

And yet sometimes, even in the softest silence, a part of me reaches without meaning to.

A part of me wonders what it would be like to let someone stay

just long enough to see why I’ve built these walls

so carefully.