Ebony…
a name I never knew, yet spoke
like a crack in quiet air—
a word that didn’t belong to me,
but carried weight like truth.
You stood there asking,
eyes searching mine for something real,
while I held nothing but confusion,
hands empty of the answer
you needed me to give.
How do I explain a ghost of a thought,
a name born out of nowhere,
stitched from sleep and silence,
mistaken for memory?
I have loved you in waking,
in every breath that counts,
yet in dreaming I betrayed nothing—
only stumbled through shadows
my mind could not name.
Ebony fades as quickly
as she came—
no face, no past, no place to stand.
Only the echo remains,
and the fear it left behind.
So hear me now, not from sleep,
but from the part of me that stays:
there is no hidden heart,
no secret I’ve kept from you—
only a dream that spoke too loudly
and a love still trying to be understood.
Letters from Xhale the magazine Words that breathe. Stories that Linger, 