I was once someone’s baby.
Cradled in hopes and stitched into dreams,
Their pride and joy, their golden light,
The soft promise of better things.
I was their future shining, sweet.
A wish whispered into the night.
The medal on a shelf of memories,
The reason they chose to fight.
But time, it slipped, as time will do,
And silence grew where voices should stay.
That baby, me was left alone,
To learn life’s rules the hardest way.
No guiding hands, no gentle maps,
Just echoes of what once had been.
I searched for faces I remembered
But none would show up again.
Where were the ones who held me close.
Who vowed they’d never let me fall?
Where are the hearts that once beat loud
For a girl so small, so full of it all?
Isn’t life fair, in all its glory?
With its glittering highs and quiet betrayals.
It lifts you up in lullabies,
Then leaves you lost in empty trails.
But still I stand, still I grow,
Still I reach for more than pain.
Because even unloved flowers bloom
In spite of drought, in spite of rain.
