The Light Already Found You

The phone buzzes in your pocket, or maybe it doesn't. You reach for it anyway, hoping for a sign that you exist, that someone out there is thinking of you.

But the screen stays dark. The silence feels like a verdict.

You put on the smile, the one that says you are fine, that you are handling it, while inside you are starving for a word that never comes. Yet there is a knowing that does not need a signal to reach you.

The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world — and it has already arrived, right here, in this quiet room where no one is watching. You do not need the world to name you for you to be real.

The father who saw his son coming home did not wait for a text or a call; he ran before the apology was even formed. He ran while the son was still rehearsing his worthlessness.

That same love is not waiting for your performance to be perfect. It is not waiting for your notification to light up.

It is already here, seeing the face behind the mask, calling you by a name no screen can display. The validation you are chasing down the hallway of the day has already found you.