A Poem by A.S.
Some people arrive like spring,
others like storms.
Not every hand we hold is meant to hold us forever.
Some are sent only to reveal the strength already living beneath our skin.
I once mistook endurance for love,
silence for peace, and sacrifice for devotion.
I kept my promises when words around me became smoke.
I stayed accountable when blame was easier.
I chose loyalty when betrayal seemed fashionable.
I believed that if I loved enough, served enough, forgave enough,
I could build a home where there was only shifting sand.
I laid down dreams that had taken years to grow,
thinking love required my own becoming smaller.
It never did.
Looking back, I see I was never difficult to love.
I was simply standing where love could not flourish.
G-d has a remarkable way of using ordinary people to teach extraordinary lessons.
One man taught me that charm without character quickly fades.
Another taught me that someone else’s demons are not mine to inherit.
Neither was my destination.
They were classrooms.
And I… I was the student who finally listened.
I discovered that my quietness was never weakness.
I hid because my heart preferred peace over applause,
while others hid from the work required to become who they pretended to be.
I discovered that being dependable is a rare kind of beauty.
That integrity is attractive long after appearance fades.
That character outlives charisma.
I discovered that I was raising my children with a love I had been searching for in others.
That surviving while motherhood had quietly revealed a strength I never stopped to celebrate.
Life asked me to fight.
Not because I was abandoned,
but because heaven wanted me to remember I was never alone.
Wars were started around me.
Storms gathered without invitation.
Yet here I stand —
not bitter, but wiser.
Not hardened, but rooted.
Not waiting to be rescued,
but walking forward with G-d beside me.
I no longer measure my worth by who stayed,
who chose me, or who failed to see me.
The right eyes never need convincing.
The right heart never asks you to disappear.
So today, I thank every lesson.
Even the painful ones.
Because they introduced me
to the woman G-d always knew I was becoming.
A woman who survives.
A woman who rebuilds.
A woman who thrives.
Not because a man completed her —
but because G-d reminded her she was whole all along.
And somewhere, another woman is still wondering if she is enough.
To her I say:
You are not too much.
You are not too broken.
You are not behind.
The lesson was never that you needed someone else to become extraordinary.
The lesson was that you always were.
Walk on.
The future has been waiting for the woman you finally chose to become.
