The Flame That Remembers

Once, I thought the universe was a clenched fist,
its silence heavy, its answers hidden.
Now I see it as an open palm,
offering no clarity, only the chance to reach.

I have stood at the edge of myself,
waiting for the dark to split like a seed,
for meaning to crack open and bloom.
But the truth is simpler:
meaning is not given; it is grown—
patiently, painfully, with hands stained by the soil of living.

Do you remember that night?
Your face was a flame flickering in the wind,
a star straining to hold its shape.
I asked why they burn,
and you said, because they must.

And so I learned:
to burn is not to conquer the dark,
but to outlast it—
to hold a quiet defiance in the face of endless night.

If we must ache, let it be for what can still root.
If we must walk, let it be toward
the soft shoulders of morning,
where light kneels gently at the edge of everything.

And if you stumble,
look for me.
I am walking too.
Not toward the stars,
but toward the wet earth beneath us—
where flames take hold in the quiet places,
and even the smallest spark remembers
how to rise.