my unspoken ways.

but i did love you.

every day.

in a thousand tiny, unspoken ways,

in the cracks between words

that felt too sharp to say aloud.

i loved you

in the flutter of moth wings,

that bruised themselves against the glass—

believing the glow was warmth,

believing the glow was you.

i loved you

in the way morning light spilled

across an empty table,

in the dust motes that danced between us,

when we stopped trying to speak.

i loved you

in the quiet folding of laundry—

your shirts soft and worn,

your scent still clinging,

a memory

that refused to fade.

i loved you

in the fragile seconds of stillness,

when the world stood so quiet,

i could hear the breaking inside me—

a shattering so gentle,

it sounded like the hum of a lullaby.

i never needed grand gestures.

you didn’t see it,

but my love was in the small things:

in the way i held back my storms

so you could stand in the sun,

in the way i let the moths gather at the light—

just to keep the darkness

away from you.

my love was a whispered prayer,

an invisible thread between us,

always pulling,

always unraveling.

but you didn’t notice.

maybe you never cared to.

and now,

i watch as the glass finally cracks,

as the moth collapses into itself,

its wings too tattered to fly.

i watch as the light burns out,

leaving only the faintest echo

of what was.

but i still loved you.

in the way broken things

love what shatters them,

in the way i clung to the pieces of you,

even as they tore through me.

i loved you,

not because i wanted to—

but because i didn’t know

how not to.

and when you walked away,

i loved you even then.

in the ache that settled in my bones,

in the hollow spaces

you left behind.

because some loves aren’t loud

or reckless.

they don’t scream

or demand to be seen.

they linger quietly,

like moths by the light—

small, fragile,

and burning for something

they were never meant to touch.

and now,

all that remains

is the ash of a thousand tiny unspoken ways.

but still,

i did love you.

REMI.