If you could read my heart,
you would not find words first—
you would find wounds.
Quiet ones,
deep ones,
the kind that bleed without ever breaking the skin.
You would see places
where I carved out pieces of myself
to make room for you—
not knowing love sometimes arrives
only to leave dust behind.
If you could read my heart,
you would see
the truth I try to hide beneath silence:
that when I sacrificed parts of my life,
my time,
my soul,
I never imagined
this
is where I would stand—
alone with echoes
that still whisper your name.
You would see pain
that doesn’t shout,
but sinks;
sharp as poison
flowing through a river
that once carried hope.
Even my blood feels heavy now,
as if sorrow has dissolved into it,
turning every heartbeat
into a reminder
of what I could not keep.
If you could read my heart,
you would find madness too—
the quiet, trembling kind
that comes from loving someone
who walks away with the parts of you
you didn’t know were missing
until they were gone.
You would see that I am not angry—
just broken in places
I didn’t know could break.
You would see
that no matter what I do,
I cannot remove you.
You are not a thought—
you are an imprint.
You are not a memory—
you are residue.
You are not a chapter—
you are carved into the spine
of every page.
If you could read my heart,
you would understand
that I do not hold you
out of stubbornness
or desperation,
but because
some loves
do not fade—
they stain.
And you—
you are the most beautiful stain
my heart has ever carried.
If you could read my heart,
you would finally know
what I cannot say without breaking:
I will live,
I will move forward,
I will breathe—
but I will never be
the same man
I was
before you walked through me
like light
through a shattered window.
This is not a plea,
nor a request—
only the truth
you would find
if you ever opened
the quiet door
behind my ribs
and listened
to the ruin
you left glowing
there.
