Mercy came knocking once, a pale wanderer draped in dawn, with weary eyes and gentle hands, carrying no sword, only the burden of understanding. But the wicked knew not her face. Their hearts were citadels of stone, where compassion died unnamed and every wound became a weapon. They barred the gates. For mercy is a stranger in the hearts of the wicked. She walks their halls unseen, a ghost among shadows, whispering of forgiveness to ears that worship vengeance. They drink from poisoned wells and call bitterness wisdom. They sharpen grief into blades and wear cruelty like a crown. Where mercy offers a bridge, they build a wall. Where mercy kneels, they strike. And so she leaves quietly, taking her light with her, while darkness settles deeper into chambers already cold. The wicked do not fear mercy, they fear what mercy reveals: that beneath their iron masks, beneath their kingdoms of pride, beneath the ruins they call strength, there lives a trembling truth they dare not face. For merc...
You were my everything,
not in the careless way people say it,
but in the quiet, consuming way
a thought becomes a home.
You lived in my mind
like a conqueror,
not with force,
But with a presence so strong
Everything else surrendered.
Every corner of me
spoke your name in silence.
Every plan I made
had your shadow beside it.
You were my forever,
or at least
That’s what I carved into my future
without asking for permission.
A soulmate, I believed,
was someone who stayed,
Someone who chose you
even when the world shifted.
But you…
You left.
Not loudly.
Not with answers.
Just enough absence
to echo through everything I was.
And something inside me
didn’t break;
It rewrote itself.
Losing you changed me.
My thoughts no longer wander
where you once were.
The softness I carried
grew edges I never planned for.
I stopped seeing the world
through “us”
and started surviving
through “me.”
Even my days feel different,
my habits,
my laughter,
the way I exist in silence.
I am not who I was
when you were here.
And maybe that’s the quiet tragedy,
Or maybe
it’s the beginning of something else.
Because the space you left…
It didn’t stay empty forever.
At first,
it ached,
a hollow place
where memories echoed too loudly.
But slowly,
without asking for permission,
I took it back.
Piece by piece,
breath by breath,
I reclaimed the parts of me
that only knew how to belong to you.
And now,
That space is gone.
Not hidden.
Not waiting.
Gone.
You no longer live in my mind
like a conqueror.
You no longer hold
the title of my forever.
You became
a chapter I survived,
not the story I remained in.
I still remember you,
but you no longer define me.
Because losing you
did not end me.
It changed me.
And in that change,
I found something unexpected,
a version of myself
that no longer needs
someone else
to feel whole.
© 2026 Gloria Penelope
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