How do I sit with myself and explain

That “failure” is the only language I’ve learned to speak?

I reach out, but there is nothing to hold,

I look within, but there is nothing left to write.

I am haunted by the question:

Will I ever be enough for a world that asks for everything?

They throw “opportunity” around like a hollow prayer,

But I am busy counting the days since a smile truly reached my eyes.

Why am I built this way?

Why does every step forward feel like a betrayal of my own progress?

Perhaps the success I chase is a horizon I was never meant to touch,

Or perhaps I am so terrified of the future

That I have forgotten how to exist in the present.

I know I am a storm—”too much” for most to weather.

I beg for grace, I plead for a sign,

And yet, I wonder if I am even worthy of the things I crave.

I look at the gifts I’ve been given and I am grateful,

But Lord, I wonder… when do I get to be me?

Maybe my pen was only ever meant to bleed in shades of pain.

Maybe I am destined to see the decay instead of the bloom,

The shadow instead of the soul.

If this is who I am supposed to be—

A silhouette of sorrow, a failure carved in the dark—

Then let me at least write it with the honesty it deserves.