Heirloom / Healing

Preface

These pieces come from growing up around things I didn't ask for; patterns I'm still trying not to repeat.

I'm working on my anger. On my reactions. On being better.
Some days I get it right. Some days I don't.
But I keep showing up to the work.

This is a snapshot of that process.

Heirloom

My mother taught me
how to see red
without opening my eyes
how to track a mood
by footsteps,
how to listen
for what wasn't said.

Love came in weather patterns
heat, withdrawal,
the storm you never see
but always brace for.

I learned
to read tone
like scripture,
to flinch
without showing it.

She named me things
no child should hear,
and I swallowed them
so they'd die in my mouth,
not grow in my hands.

I do not mirror
the mouth that made me.
I don't need
to become her
to understand her.

I won't raise children,
but I end the cycle
just the same
I would not teach them
to brace for love
as if it's a blow.

I am the broken branch
that roots itself elsewhere.
I grow sideways.
I don't reach
for what raised me.

I am the first
to unlearn violence
and call it love.
To touch the wound
and not strike.

This is where it ends.
This is where it breaks.
This inheritance
goes no further.
I am the last
to carry it.
And the first
to lay it down.

Healing

I get frustrated over small things
a dropped spoon,
a misplaced key,
stuttering over my words,
a door that doesn't close the first time.

It's rarely about the thing.
It's the weight
beneath the thing.
The tight thread of anxiety
wrapped too long
around the wrong part of me.

Sometimes it catches fire
before I even know it's heat.

That's when I have to stop
not because I feel calm,
but because I don't.
Because I've learned
that silence can be stronger
than saying what I'll have to apologize for.

It's not easy.
It's not neat.
Sometimes the old reflex
still wins the first move.
But I breathe.
I listen.
I try again.

Not to be perfect
but to be someone
who doesn't make their partner flinch,
who doesn't set a room
on edge.

I am still learning
how to let the feeling pass
without dragging someone through it.

There is no applause
for this kind of growth.
But she sees me.
And I stay.

That's what healing looks like today
not peace,
but practice.