The Light Runs Into Your Tears

The afternoon sun is high, and the world expects you to be moving, but inside, the grief feels like it has unpacked its bags and settled in for good. You laugh at a colleague's joke, and for a split second, the panic rises — the fear that you are a fraud because the sorrow is still there, heavy and permanent in your chest.

But listen — the light does not ask you to evict the grief before it can shine. There is a father who saw his son coming home from a long way off, and before the apology, before the speech — he ran.

The light runs toward you not despite your tears, but into them. Your laughter is not a lie; it is a crack where the light gets out.

The grief is real, but it is not the whole story. You are not a fraud; you are a person carrying a heavy thing while still letting the light shine through.