Lingering Note
A poem
I was given a song meant for happy endings.
It had sunlight tucked between its verses,
little promises dressed in gold,
and a melody that sounded like
two people finding their way home
to the same pair of waiting arms.
It was the sort of song
one sang with their eyes closed,
smiling at a future
that had already begun to feel like memory—
a table set for two,
a window left open,
a name spoken without fear
of what silence might follow.
I learned every word.
I practiced the tenderness of its chorus,
let the sweeter notes settle on my tongue,
and imagined how lovely it must be
to sing of love
without wondering how long it would last.
But somewhere between the first verse
and the promise of forever,
my voice began to change.
The sunlight dimmed.
The gold grew pale.
And the melody, once light enough
to carry through an open window,
became something I could barely hold
without feeling it tremble.
I sang of staying
with the ache of someone who remembers leaving.
I sang of home
while keeping one ear turned toward the road.
I sang of being loved
as though the words themselves
might teach my heart
what it means to feel safe.
And isn't that a strange thing—
to have a song full of happiness
and still sound as though
you are saying goodbye?
Perhaps it is because
every beautiful note has learned
to make room for a question.
Will you come?
Will the road be kind to you?
Will the mountains loosen their hold?
Will the days return what they have borrowed,
or will I find myself standing here
long after the music has ended,
still listening for a familiar step?
I hate how hope can make a home
out of the smallest things.
A date becomes a candle
I am afraid to let burn out.
A sentence becomes a window
I keep returning to
just to make sure it is still open.
A promise, even an uncertain one,
becomes a little place in the future
where I begin to put my happiness.
And then the hours pass.
The candle shortens.
The window gathers dust.
The future remains a room
I cannot enter,
no matter how many times
I turn the handle.
Still, I find myself singing.
I sing while folding the day away,
while the evening settles over the house,
while the world carries on
with its ordinary, untroubled noise.
I sing as though somewhere,
beyond the distance I cannot cross,
the melody might find you.
As though you might recognize
the trembling beneath the sweetness,
the small hesitation before the chorus,
the way my voice lingers
on every word that sounds like stay.
I wonder if you would hear it.
Would you notice that the song
has grown heavier in my keeping?
That I have been carrying its tomorrow
through so many lonely todays
that even the thought of happiness
sometimes feels like work?
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I am tired.
Not of the song,
nor of the love that gave it meaning,
but of being its only singer.
Tired of holding the final note
with no assurance
that another voice will answer.
Tired of keeping a place
for someone whose arrival
belongs to a future
I cannot ask to hurry.
And sometimes,
I wish I could put the song down.
Let the instruments fall quiet.
Close the window.
Blow out the candle
without wondering whether
the darkness will mistake it for surrender.
I want to rest
without turning every silence
into a language I must decipher.
I want to wake
without measuring the distance
between what I hope for
and what the day has given me.
I want, just once,
to sing a happy love song
and mean every word.
To reach the chorus
without fear gathering in my throat.
To sing forever
without hearing all the ways
a beautiful thing might end.
But the heart is a stubborn instrument.
Even when the hands grow weary,
even when the strings have been stretched
too tightly between longing and loss,
some small note remains.
Quiet.
Unsteady.
Almost too faint to hear.
Yet there it is.
Not a promise.
Not proof.
Not even the certainty
that the song will find its ending.
Only a little hope
that refuses to leave
even when the singer
has begun to tire.
And so I sing again.
Not because I know
you will come home,
but because some part of me
still believes there is a home
worth coming to.
My voice breaks where the joy should be.
My heart aches where the music should soar.
And every sweet refrain
carries the weight
of all the things I cannot know.
Perhaps, one day,
the song will find its other singer.
Perhaps the waiting will become
nothing more than a story
I tell in the quiet
of a home that no longer feels empty.
Perhaps I will reach the final verse
and discover that I no longer need
to listen for footsteps
between the notes.
Until then,
let the song be imperfect.
Let it carry the longing,
the fear,
the disappointment,
the hope that survives them all.
Let it sound like a prayer
I never meant to write.
Because even now,
with a tired heart
and a voice full of almosts,
I am still singing
of the happiness I want to believe in—
and leaving one small space
between the final notes,
just in case
you are on your way home.
