The night never asked permission
to swallow her whole,
my mother, with her frayed nerve endings
and shattered mirrors for eyes,
her mind a house with too many doors,
each one opening to a different self,
a different terror.
I learned silence from her trembling hands,
how love could twist into something sharp,
how the woman who gave me life
could look through me like a stranger
on a crowded street.
Pain is not a lesson,
it’s the first language you forget
but your body remembers:
the hollow where safety should be,
the silence after the scream,
the way your ribs ache
from holding so much alone.
They never tell you
how lonely healing can be
how you’ll trace your scars
like a map to places
that no longer exist,
how you’ll miss the monsters
because at least they were familiar.
But here is how you begin:
With the small rebellions
the morning you wake
and see only your own face
looking back from the mirror.
The first time you say “no”
and your voice doesn’t crack.
The moment you realize
survival is the quietest revolution.
You learn to walk again
not toward some bright horizon,
but through the wreckage,
each step a declaration:
“I am still here.”
The mind that was your prison
becomes your sanctuary.
Where there were ghosts,
you plant gardens.
Where there were wounds,
you let the light in.
And one day,
you will stand in the center
of your own life
and recognize the miracle:
not that you survived
(though that is miracle enough)
but that somewhere
in the broken places,
you learned how to grow
new dawns
from the darkness

– Christy Farris

Note: This piece was originally published at QuietMuse77.com