This Is for the Hearts That Refused to Break

This is not a poem.

This is a quiet rebellion.

This is for you—

the one who cried behind locked doors

and still showed up with a smile the next day.

You were not built to break.

But they tried to teach you how to collapse.

They handed you mirrors that only reflected your faults.

They gave you hearts that came with expiration dates.

They measured your worth by how much you could endure

and called your silence strength.

And you believed them.

You believed that to be soft was to be weak.

That to cry was to be dramatic.

That to say no was to be selfish.

That to want more was ungrateful.

But inside you,

a small flicker refused to go out.

It wasn’t loud.

It didn’t scream for justice.

It just… stayed.

Like a candle in a windstorm.

You have been through things

you still don’t have the words for.

The betrayal that came like a whisper.

The loss that carved its initials into your chest.

The night when everything ended—

and you still woke up the next morning.

People think survival looks like fire.

But sometimes, it looks like brushing your teeth

after crying for two hours.

It looks like answering a message when you don’t want to be alive.

It looks like not telling anyone

you’re unraveling—

because you don’t want to worry them.

You are not a story of tragedy.

You are a story of defiance.

They told you that if you kept forgiving,

you’d be used up.

But you still love.

They told you that if you kept hoping,

you’d only be disappointed.

But you still dream.

They told you that if you kept trusting,

you’d be broken.

But you still believe in people.

That’s not foolishness.

That’s strength that terrifies the world.

You loved the wrong people—

but you still kept your heart open.

You failed—

but you still believed you were worthy.

You lost everything—

but somehow,

you still believed in tomorrow.

You are a miracle

dressed in ordinary skin.

Let them say you’re too much.

Too emotional.

Too sensitive.

Too soft.

Too open.

Those are your superpowers.

Let them try to harden you.

Let them hand you their bitterness like armor.

You don’t need it.

Because you learned how to bleed

and still not lose your color.

This is for the girls who never got apologies.

The boys who were told not to cry.

The mothers who had to be everything for everyone.

The sons who never got to say what they really felt.

This is for the queer kid who was told to stay quiet.

The hijabi who carries stories in silence.

The man who never learned how to say, “I’m not okay.”

This is for you.

And when the world tells you to give up,

to harden,

to be cold—

You will stay soft.

Because the world does not need more walls.

It needs people like you—

the ones who survived everything

without losing their ability to feel.

You are not broken.

You are healing out loud.

You are not behind.

You are rewriting timelines.

You are not small.

You are the ocean inside a teacup—

meant to spill into places that forgot how to feel.

So this—

this story, this whisper, this fire in soft skin—

is for you.

This is for the hearts that refused to break

no matter how many times the world handed them reasons to.

And one day,

you’ll meet someone

who recognizes the war you’ve been through

without you having to say a word.

And when they do,

you’ll realize:

You were never weak.

You were just strong in a language they didn’t understand.