One Who Learned Too Late

I once believed that hands could hold more than air
That words could shape something lasting
But I have seen how voices fade
How silence lingers longer than names

I built a dream from open heart
Only to watch them slip away
I followed footsteps beside my own
Only to find the ground was never steady

You ask if the wind can bear you forward
But the air does not remember
You wait for the stars to answer
But their light only reaches what is already gone

I called out once
To the sea, to the sky, to the names I thought were mine
The tide replied with absence
The sky with indifference
The names with nothing at all

What is trust
If not a tether to something that shifts?
What is need
If not a voice left unheard?

You will learn, as I did
That no hands will catch you
That no road will rise to meet you
That the only weight you carry
Is your own

Let go
Not because it is easy
But because nothing will hold you
The way you wish it would

And still, you walk

Not waiting
Not reaching
Just moving
Yearning
No answer
Nobody

I was born alone
I will die alone