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When Your Hands Are Empty #poemofhope #faithpoetry #spokenwordpoetry

There will be a season when you have done all you know to do and still, nothing. No answer at the door. No sudden change. No sign in the sky telling you that tomorrow will be kinder. Just you, your unanswered prayer, and the strange silence that makes you question whether God is still listening. He is. Do not mistake silence for absence. Some of God's deepest work happens without making a sound. Roots grow in darkness. Healing happens beneath skin. Morning begins long before the window knows there is light. And somewhere beyond what you can see, your life is being moved by hands you cannot follow. So do not abandon your faith because you cannot trace God's footsteps. You were never promised a clear view. You were given enough light for the next step. Take it. Even if your knees shake. Even if your heart has questions your mouth is afraid to ask. Take it. Faith is not a life without uncertainty. It is waking up with uncertainty beside you and refusing to let it choose your direc...
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The old woman and her Jungle House. #shortstory

Deep in the jungle, where paths forget themselves and birds grow silent, stood her house. It leaned as if it were listening, its walls darkened by years of secrets. People said going there was a journey with no return—and those who laughed at the warning were never seen again.

The old lady lived alone. No family, no friends, no visitors she didn’t invite. Her smile was famous in nearby villages, but not for warmth. It was a tight, bloodless curve of the lips, stretched too carefully, as if it had been practiced in a mirror for decades. It never reached her eyes. Those eyes were always busy—measuring, planning, deciding.

She was mean in ways that didn’t shout. Her cruelty whispered.

Beneath the house was a basement carved into the earth, damp and airless. That was where people disappeared to. Travelers who needed rest. Relatives who trusted blood too much. Strangers who believed old age meant weakness. She locked them away and broke them slowly, not with chains alone, but with time. Years passed underground. People forgot their names. They became hands, backs, shadows—slaves to her quiet commands.

No one was special to her. Not cousins. Not nephews. Not those who shared her bloodline. Love had no meaning in that house. She needed no one, and that was the most dangerous thing about her. Loneliness did not frighten her—it empowered her.

Above ground, she moved calmly, tending her plants, cooking her meals, smiling at anyone unlucky enough to cross her path. Hypocrisy clung to her like perfume. Evil lived in her patience, in the way she waited for the right moment.

Those who thought they could leave learned too late: the jungle listened to her. The house obeyed her. And endings came suddenly—unexpectedly—like a door closing where a future once stood.

The old lady remained alone, just as she preferred. And the jungle kept her secrets well.


© 2026 Gloria Penelope

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