The Light Remains When The Screen Goes Black

The screen lights up your face in the dark, a small circle of memory in a room full of silence. You scroll until the ache becomes too heavy to carry, then you lock the phone and turn away, as if the looking itself was something to be ashamed of.

But the light does not scold you for needing to feel close to what is gone. It stands in the quiet with you, neither condemning the grief nor the sudden shame that follows it.

There is a truth that has been here all along, waiting beneath the images and the pain: the kingdom you are searching for is not back there in the photos, nor is it somewhere you have to travel to find it. It is inside you, right now, in the very breath you are holding.

You came from the light, and the light does not vanish when the screen goes black.