Absolution

They do not touch a page and wonder if it will forgive them.

But I do.

I approach the page like a sinner approaches light with awe, with trembling, and with the knowledge that illumination burns.

There are days I hesitate before every stroke, not because I lack for words, but because I fear what they will become once freed.

Ink has memory. Paper has judgment. And somewhere between the two, I lose the illusion that this is just writing.

Because it never is. It’s confession, it’s consequence, it’s ceremony.

The blank page is not my canvas. It is my witness.

You cannot just think a sentence like this. You must survive it. You must pull it out of the place you buried it and look it in the eye as it screams.

My fingers cramp. My breath shortens. I pause mid-line because something ugly and primal just surged up from the dark, and I don’t know if I’m ready to let it speak.

I envy those who write casually who spill thoughts with the breeziness of conversation. But that’s not what this is…

for me.

For me, it’s sacred. Violent. A communion and an exorcism in equal measure.

I bleed in metaphors so my wound will look beautiful.

for the lies I’ve dressed as memories, and the truths I’ve twisted until they fit neatly into a sentence.

Do you know what it is to edit your own grief?

To sculpt sorrow into pretty phrases because the truth of agony is too ugly for paper?

I do. And sometimes I hate myself for it. Sometimes I read what I’ve written and wonder: Did I betray the real version, just to make it readable?

What if there’s a part of my story that died for the rhythm?

Not because I want to. But because I must.

Because silence builds walls inside me. Because if I do not write it, I will carry it. And it is already too heavy.

Even if the page resents me, even if it cowers in the corners whimpering from the burden asked, I return.

I always return.

Not seeking redemption only permission to tell the truth without flinching.

in rare, unspoken moments the page becomes kind.

It doesn’t scream or weep or split open under the pressure.

It simply sits.

Quietly.

And in that silence, I hear something that sounds almost like grace.