Freedom That Cost Me

Freedom That Cost Me

I chased freedom like it owed me something,

Like it would hand me peace if I ran fast enough,

Every door I opened felt like a victory,

Every goodbye felt like a kind of power.

I did not stay long enough to be seen,

Did not root myself deep enough to grow,

I called it living without ties or weight,

Never naming the emptiness it became.

There were nights that felt wide and endless,

Cities that held me without asking why,

Faces that came and went without meaning,

And mornings that carried no memory at all.

I told myself this was what strength looked like,

To never need, to never stay, to never bend,

Yet somewhere beneath all that constant motion,

Was a quiet voice I refused to defend.

Now stillness feels unfamiliar and sharp,

Like something I never learned how to hold,

Freedom lost its shine when no one remained,

When silence replaced the stories I told.

I see now it was not chains I escaped,

It was connection I kept pushing away,

And in choosing a life with no one to answer to,

I built one where no one chose to stay.

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