Not Mine to Hold

I held your silence like a sacred thread,

And named it love when it was absence dressed.

You asked for faith, for time, for space instead,

While I stood whole, and gave you all my best.

You knew the warmth, yet chose the colder ground,

Where work and distance shielded you from truth.

I was not lost you were the one unbound. From presence, promise, courage, and from proof.

I prayed for you, your dead, your living name, While losing what I could not earn again.

My giving stood untouched by guilt or blame. Yours trembled, felt, but never chose to mend.

I leave with grace no debt, no claim, no plea: What stayed was real. What left was never me.