Lil Rabbits Echoes

One grain does not make a heap. You agree. Two grains do not make a heap. You agree. I add one more. And one more. At what grain did you change your mind without noticing you changed it? When did a little become a lot while you were looking away? There is no bell, no line in the sand. It just becomes. At what hair did you become bald? At what sorry did it become an apology? At what day did we become strangers? You cannot point to the moment, but you still live inside the after. -𝕃ℝ 🖤

Life is not in the big moments. Not the wedding, not the diploma, not the day you thought would change everything. Life is in the in-between breaths. The kitchen coffee gone cold. The gas station sunset. The way your mom says your name when she's not worried. You miss your life waiting for your life to start. -LR 🖤

My father had an old law in our house. He didn't have much to give us, but he gave us that sentence like a piece of furniture we would need later. "Can't never could do nothing." I didn't understand it then. I thought can't was honest. I thought it was me telling the truth about my limits. Now I am older and I see, can't is not honesty, it is habit. It is the voice of every person who quit and needed company. It is the echo of every room you left too early. We think we are describing the world when we say I can't. But we are really describing ourselves. We are drawing a circle around our life and calling it fate. And fate is not a wall. Fate is a field you have not walked yet. There will be days you cannot move mountains. No one is asking you to. We are only asking you to stop worshiping the mountain, to stop kneeling before the idea of it. Pick up one stone. Move it one inch. That is how order is made. That is how a life is made. Not in one brave mome...

There are years where you do not live. You just endure. You watch the days blur into one long hallway with too many doors and no light at the end. You get up because the alarm says to. You smile because people expect it. You say "I'm fine" because the truth would take too long. Inside, everything is loud. A mind that never stops talking. A chest that never stops aching. The feeling that everyone else got a map and you got static. You try to hold it together. You try to be good, be steady, be someone your younger self would be proud of. And some nights you are sure you are failing at all of it. That is the chaos. Not dramatic. Not cinematic. Just the quiet weight of carrying a life that doesn't feel like yours. But even there, something stubborn remains. You wash the dishes. You take the walk even when your legs feel like stone. You keep a promise to yourself when no one is watching. One small, ordered thing inside the disorder. And then another. And another. You don...

I don’t know how to explain it   without sounding like I’m bragging   or grieving.   I just move through the world   with him in my posture.   Shoulders back, even when   my heart is tired.   Eyes open, even when   I want to believe everyone’s good.   He didn’t sit me down   with rules.   He just was.   And I watched.   How he listened.   How he waited before he spoke.   How he could be soft   without ever looking weak.   How he loved people   and still knew where the door was.   So I’m different, I guess.   Not louder. Not harder.   Just… awake.   I feel everything,   and I clock everything.   I’ll cry with you   and I’ll still notice   if your hands shake   when you say you’re fine.   I am my father’s daughter...

I talk to the dark when I can’t sleep   because silence is louder than my doubt.   I build walls with my hands   and punish myself for the loneliness   they were meant to prevent.   I crave the blade and the bandage.   I run toward fires just to prove   I can walk out without burning.   Then I weep over the ash   like I didn’t strike the match.   I am the hunger and the fast.   The locked door and the key   swallowed by my own throat.   Tell me I’m healing —   I’ll show you where I hide the knife.   I fall in love with the leaving.   I map every exit in a room   before I learn your name.   But I’ll memorize the sound of your breathing   and call it home. Then I’ll burn the house down   to see if you’d still find me in the smoke.   I want to be understood   without having...

We were told death was stone,   a law cut into bone,   cold as gravity, old as rust.   But stone can be shaped by hands.   And these hands were ours. We carved an ending into the marble   because we thought edges made things beautiful.   Called it “natural” the way we call   a funeral beautiful: with flowers   to hide the wood of the box. Hell, at least, posts its signage in fire.   No footnotes. No branding strategy.   It says I am what burns and means it.   We say I am what heals while picking at the scab.   We say I am what loves while keeping the receipts.   We are deep because we are dishonest.   The abyss has levels. The lie has architecture. If mortality was a preference,   then so is the pretending.   So is the mask that swears it’s a face.   So is the story we tell about the mask   while the face unde...