Fragments of Yesterday
There’s a box in the corner
where the light barely reaches.
You’ve passed it a hundred times,
let it gather dust,
hoping sealed meant gone.
Today your fingers find it.
Trembling as they lift the lid,
knowing what’s inside
isn’t just old sketches–
it’s you.
The version you buried.
An old sketchbook. Pages yellowed.
Cover cracked like dry skin.
Heavier than it looks,
not in your hands
but in your chest.
Each page is a shard
of a hidden life.
Delicate lines carrying
the weight of the world
they came from.
A face stares back. Yours, but younger.
Eyes wide with a fear
that still whispers
when the night goes still
and your thoughts refuse to sleep.
You remember those nights.
The silence outside was nothing
compared to the storm within.
The only peace you found
was pencil on paper–
the rhythm of making something
out of the chaos.
Another page. A house.
Windows dark, walls towering.
It was supposed to be a home.
You drew it over and over,
trying to capture the feeling
of needing to escape
and not knowing how.
But you didn’t stay.
You found a way out,
even though the memories followed,
even though they still whisper
when the world goes quiet.
You close the sketchbook.
Heart heavy. Spirit lighter.
You’ve stared the past down
and you’re still here.
You place it back in the box
but leave the lid open.
Not as a wound.
As proof.