You Do Not Have to Sing

The house is quiet now, but your mind is still rehearsing tomorrow. You are waking up before them, not to pray, but to memorize the exact tone you'll use so they don't think you're still mad.

You are trying to engineer a voice that sounds safe, hoping that if you get the pitch right, the peace will stick. But the light does not need your performance to know your heart.

It was there in the anger, and it is here in the fear. You are exhausting yourself trying to manage a reaction that hasn't even happened yet.

The gathering dark is not a place to rehearse your lines. It is the place where you put the mask down.

The truth is already known to the one who sees you in the shadows. You do not have to sing the right note to be loved.

You only have to be real.