The Night I Lost Myself

The night I lost myself,

the sky was quiet —

too quiet.

Even the stars refused to blink.

I didn’t notice when it started.

It wasn’t a scream,

or a fall,

or a shattering of glass.

It was the absence of feeling.

Like someone dimmed the light inside me

and forgot to turn it back on.

I moved through rooms I once called home,

yet nothing felt like mine.

Pictures stared back blankly,

books didn’t remember my touch.

Even the mirror blinked —

and forgot who I was.

I whispered my name.

Not out loud,

just in my head —

but it echoed like a stranger’s.

I used to laugh in this room.

I used to cry,

dance barefoot on the floor,

burn toast and write letters I never sent.

Now it’s just walls and dust

and a version of me I no longer recognize.

Grief doesn’t always arrive in black.

Sometimes,

it wears the face you see in the mirror.

And healing?

It doesn’t come all at once.

It comes in breaths —

short, sharp, stolen.

It comes when the silence isn’t so loud.

When your reflection starts to blink again.

But that night,

I was gone.

And no one noticed —

not even me.