The Long, Short Run

---

Words slip through fingers,

like water in morning light—

I sit with the silence,

dream-echoed and hollow.

Yesterday wore me

like an old coat of sorrow,

dragging my feet to the door,

asking nothing but movement.

The road met me empty,

body bruised with memory,

and somewhere around three kilometres in,

the dam broke—

tears racing faster

than my breath could catch.

A sob becomes a storm.

Years collapse into flashes—

grief long cradled now escaping,

clumsy and aching,

through the cracks in my resolve.

I stopped.

Not to quit,

but to feel.

Palms on my face,

head bowed,

crying into the breathless afternoon,

and it felt—

like release.

Like something

had finally let go.

Baz wasn’t called.

Instinct silenced.

Instead, I stayed.

Breathed through the ache,

ran through the wreckage

of what I thought I couldn’t carry.

And when the sadness softened,

my breath returned.

The anxiety dissolved,

and I stood in the centre of it all,

not broken,

not brave—

but still moving.

Somewhere in that quiet,

I found a kind of grace,

and a quiet pride

for not turning back.

Image Generated by ChatGPT - The Long, Short Run