Light Shining Through the Screaming Noise

The word lands in the room, and suddenly the coffee cup, the sunlight, the clock on the wall—all of it dissolves into static. You are standing in the middle of a crowded morning, smiling at a colleague, while inside you are screaming because the world has stopped making sense.

The mask feels heavy today, doesn't it? Like lead painted to look like skin.

You wear it because you have to, because the day demands it, but behind the eyes, everything is noise. Yet there is a silence that the noise cannot touch.

It is not the absence of sound, but a presence that stands beneath the fear. The light does not need the noise to stop before it can reach you.

It shines right through the chaos, right through the diagnosis, right through the trembling hands holding the mask. It was there before the word was spoken, and it is there now, waiting for you to stop performing long enough to feel it.

You do not have to be strong for the light to hold you.