You were the hush in my riot.
The moonlight that spilled like secrets on my restless skin.
You, soft edges and deep gravity—
a stillness I never knew I was starving for.
I, wildfire and broken compass,
always running toward something
or from someone,
but with you…
I stayed.
Just long enough to see myself reflected
in the calm of your gaze.

You were my yin.
Shadow and breath,
ritual and rhythm.
A sacred slowness.
You’d wrap the world in whispers,
speak to the ache in me
like it had a name and a place to heal.
You danced barefoot through my ruin,
and I mistook your peace for passivity,
your silence for surrender.

I was your yang.
Thunder without pause,
a hunger that mistook motion for meaning.
I broke things just to see if they would love me after.
I lit candles in places meant for reckoning.
I loved loud—
but not always well.
I wanted to protect you,
but forgot the ways fire can burn
even when it means to warm.

And still,
you held me
like I was the poem and the poet,
the wound and the remedy,
the storm and the sky.
You saw balance
where I only saw battle.

Now,
in the absence,
I understand.
We were more than lovers.
We were polarity.
We were the breath between creation and collapse.
We were medicine in opposing forms—
not always meant to last,
but always meant to change.

So I keep your softness in my chest,
fold it like a prayer,
repeat it when I forget what it means
to be gentle.

You were my yin.
I was your yang.
We were whole
for a while.
And sometimes,
that’s enough.