Homesick for a Place That Never Was.

I dream of doorways I’ve never walked through, windows that hold the light just right, a porch that creaks under my imagined steps, where no one waits— but it still feels like home. There’s a tree I’ve never climbed, whose branches know my name. A kitchen with cracked tiles that hum lullabies I’ve never heard but somehow know by heart. I ache for the scent of rain on soil my feet have never touched. For laughter in a room I never sat in, for warmth I only borrowed in dreams. It is not a place, but a feeling— a longing stitched into my ribs, a whisper that follows when the world is too loud. I carry it with me, this home that never was, and grieve it as if I lost it. Even though I never really had it to begin with.