I won’t tell you how I stayed When I should’ve walked away How I let silence take my side Because I thought love meant delay I won’t tell you I forgave Things I never understood Or how I shrunk myself to fit What someone called “being good” I won’t mention all the times I rehearsed the perfect line Only to swallow it again When her mood rewrote the rhyme I won’t hand you all my bruises Wrapped in lessons I misused I’ll just say: “Be kind, be strong” And hope that’s somehow true I won’t tell you how I shut down When they said “be a man” How I mistook fear for pride And wore it like a plan I won’t share the nights I doubted My worth in a stranger’s bed Or how I let hands hold me Who barely knew what I had said I won’t teach you how to fight Yourself just to stay kind But I’ll watch you learn the cost Of keeping peace inside your mind I won’t say that love feels heavy Even when it says it’s light That “forever” is a mirror Some people hang in fading light I won’t cry when you get hurt I’ll nod and let you speak And I’ll wish that I could warn you Without sounding like the weak But if one night you can’t sleep And the quiet feels too loud Know that I once stayed too long Trying not to make her proud One day, you’ll meet someone Who makes your heart race — Too fast, too hard, Too wrong to last. And you’ll think that’s love. But remember: What grips tight Doesn’t always hold true. And the one who stays silent Might be the one Who’s learned the most. I might tell you someday. But probably too late. Like everything we learn By living what someone else couldn’t say.