There’s a quiet shame I carry
not because I’m unwilling,
but because I cannot
do what they did.

My parents wore endurance
like skin
worked through the ache,
through the silence,
through the decades.

They built a life from sacrifice,
held their breath
so, I could breathe.

And now I sit in the afterglow
of their labor,
overwhelmed by what I cannot hold.

I wasn’t made to push through
in the same way.
Not because I’m weak,

but because I was born to feel
what was never felt.
To heal
what was never spoken.

To rest,
where they ran.
To listen,
where they had to survive.

It doesn’t make me lesser.
It makes me the next verse
in a sacred song.

I honor the lineage
by choosing differently.
I honor them
by living what they never could.
By freeing the parts of our bloodline
that were told to stay silent.

May my pause
be their peace.
May my softness
be their liberation.
May my refusal to suffer quietly
be the way I say:
I remember you. I thank you. I carry us forward.