They Never Knew

They came to be helped.

Battered by life, broken by love, searching for answers in the quiet corners of a room where words are whispered, not shouted.

They sat across from me, eyes heavy with things they couldn’t name,

hearts carrying storms they didn’t know how to weather.

They thought I was the one holding the map.

That I knew the way through the darkness.

That I was the helper.

But in truth..

they were the ones who held the gentle light my spirit had lost sight of.

With every trembling story, with every silence that begged to be heard, with every brave unraveling of pain -

I was the one quietly stitched back together.

They never saw the cracks in me.

I hid them well.

But in holding space for their healing, somehow, the light slipped through and found mine.

They came to be saved,

and yet it was their rawness that rescued me.

Their truth became my tether.

Their resilience - my reflection.

So now, I carry this sacred irony with me:

that in giving, I was given.

That in helping them rise, I, too, stood again.

They came to be helped..

and never once knew they were helping me all along.