A hidden love burns bright,
Then pales before the day.
What lived in careful, quiet hands
Was never meant to stay.
It asked for something whole,
For courage, truth, and room.
But I was rooted to my life
And could not let it bloom.
Your reasons, they were real.
My fear was real there too.
So love was not the thing that failed.
I only could not choose.
And now I see you still,
Speak gently, say your name,
As if my heart had learned to rest,
As if I were the same.
But grief does not grow loud
In every kind of loss.
Some griefs are worn in silence first,
And counted at a cost.
I could have begged for more,
Could hope you’d turn once more,
But love should not be asked to stay
Where it was not before.
So I will keep you near
In the small ways that remain,
And bear the commonness of days
Made strange by quiet pain.
For I would lose too much
To cast you from my sight,
And yet to keep you in my world
Still wounds me by its light.
Some loves do not grow old.
They do not turn to stone.
They simply change to something else.
A heart must bear alone.
And that is what this is:
No anger, no disguise,
Just knowing we were briefly true
Beneath unyielding skies.