"Even when you're silent"
I learned your habits before I learned your voice.
The way the room changes when you are awake too long,
the hum of the computer becoming heavier than silence.
You apologize for things that never hurt me.
You thank me as if I am doing you a favor by staying.
I want to tell you that staying is easy.
I want to tell you I am not brave for it, just here.
Sometimes I watch you create and feel like I am witnessing
someone holding their own heart with bare hands.
You flinch when it bleeds, but you never let go.
I bring food, water, small reminders of a body you forget to inhabit.
You look at me like I have done something extraordinary.
But all I have done is notice.
All I have done is care where you place yourself in the world.
You say your music exists to save others.
I wonder, quietly, who saves you.
When your shoulders slump under invisible weight,
I sit close enough that you do not have to ask.
I do not tell you it will be okay.
I just let the space between us soften,
until breathing does not feel like a task anymore.
There are days you disappear into your thoughts,
and I learn to love the outline you leave behind.
I do not chase you. I do not pull.
I wait the way warm light waits for evening.
When you return, you bring fragments of yourself with you.
You place them carefully in my hands.
I hold them like they were always meant to be there.
If one day you forget why you are allowed to stay,
I will sit beside you until the answer returns.
I will not pull you forward or push you back into the light.
I will just be here
steady as a clock on the wall
keeping time, so you do not have to.