She Heard Me Through the Clouds

Notes from the Hollow Bone  |  entry twenty-eight

It had been raining for days, the sky a thick gray curtain that hid every star. I hadn’t seen her in what felt like forever, and I didn’t realize how much I missed her until I whispered it out loud — “Mother Moon, please, just a moment.”

Tonight, she answered. I caught her light through my window, just a sliver, and I ran outside into the mud and chill like a child seeing an old friend. For a few precious minutes, the clouds parted, and she looked right at me.

I don’t know why it moved me the way it did — maybe it was the reminder that I’m still seen, still heard, even in the quiet. Maybe it was peace finding its way back home.

She Heard Me Through the Clouds

It had been days

since her face found the night—

rain swallowed the stars,

veiling her light.

The sky forgot its shimmered song,

and I forgot to what I belonged.

I missed her —

not as one misses a season,

but as a soul aches

without reason.

Last night, I whispered into the dark,

not knowing the unknowns that be.

I love the rain, Mother Moon,

but ache when it hides you from me.

A random peek past my window sill,

her light reflecting from beyond the hill.

The clouds pulled back—

just for a breath of time.

And in all the world,

she saw me, and she was mine.

Shoes pressing into softened earth,

I met her gaze and felt rebirth.

Her light brushed over every doubt,

and in that glow, I breathed it out.

Not healed, not whole, but here again—

the kind of peace that has no end.

Still here.

Still seen.

Still part of it all.

And that was enough—

for me, at nightfall.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

The Language of Wind

Notes from the Hollow Bone  |  entry twenty-seven

There are nights when the wind feels alive — not just as air, but as presence. Last night was one of them. Out here in the quiet countryside, it moved through the trees like something ancient remembering its shape. The branches bent and swayed, making way for its passage — a choreography of grace and surrender. Shadows rippled, light shifted, and the whole landscape seemed to breathe with it.

It wasn’t just the trees that moved. It was as if the earth and sky were speaking in a language I had always known but never learned to name. There was a pull — both eerie and welcoming — like being invited into an old memory I didn’t know was mine.

This morning, the wind has stilled, but its lesson lingers. Becoming, I think, is not about changing. It’s about remembering what has always been speaking — the rhythm beneath the noise, the quiet truth inside the moving world.

The Language of Wind

Last night, the wind spoke in a language older than fear.
The trees bowed to listen.
Light slipped between their ribs,
and shadows rippled like breath across the earth.

Everything moved as one body—
a living symphony of grace and surrender.

And in that moment, I understood—
to become is not to change,
but to recognize what has always been speaking.

Spell of the First Wind

Before breath had a name or form,
the wind was the voice that shaped the storm.
It taught the trees the art of sway,
and whispered, all returns someday.
To stand and listen is to obey.

With Grace & Ink,
Mai

The Quiet Above

Notes from the Hollow Bone  |  entry twenty-six

 The stars have known stillness since before there was breath to name it.
They watched the first fires burn, the first hearts beat,
and they never hurried.
They understand what I am just beginning to learn—
that stillness isn’t the absence of motion,
it’s the pulse between moments,
the inhale that holds the universe in suspension.

 When I stand beneath them, I feel both ancient and new.
I can almost hear the echo of all who’ve looked up before me,
those who wondered where we came from
and why the dark feels like home.
Their curiosity hums through me,
a thread of remembering that stretches across time.

 To be still is not to stop; it is to be in.
In breath, in sight, in sound, in the quiet dance of existence.
The stars already know this.
They’ve been teaching it forever—
not through answers,
but through their patience to simply be.

Spell for Stillness

By the stars’ slow-turning grace,
I learn the rhythm time won’t chase.
No voice, no rush, no call to climb—
just breath that folds itself in time.

Let questions fade like smoke set free;
what’s meant will drift back home to me.
The quiet hums, the night forgives,
and every stillness softly lives.

So may I rest where echoes start,
with open eyes and steady heart.
The stars remind what souls have known—
to be still is to come home.

 With Grace & Ink,
  Mai

Between Sky & Flame

Notes from the Hollow Bone  |  entry twenty-five

If fire could speak, its words would say,
I burn to give the night its day.
My crack and hiss, my golden breath,
are life remade through holy death.

And from above, the sky would call,
I see your dance, I bless it all.
Your smoke ascends, your embers gleam,
and wake the stars within my dream.

Between the two, my spirit stands,
with ash and awe within my hands.
I am the bridge, the voice, the thread,
where earth is born and stars are fed.

For what is lost returns the same—
as sky remembers every flame.

With Grace & Ink,
Mai

Spell for the Falling Star

Notes from the Hollow Bone  |  entry twenty-four

By chance or grace, the heavens spun,
and I caught a star while catching none.
No wish was made, no prayer was planned—
just light that slipped through mortal hands.

 The sky was laughing, wide and far,
reminding me how young we are.
To play, to pause, to look, to see—
the world still hums with mystery.

 So dance with dusk, let wonder start,
unclutter mind, unarmor heart.
For those who look, the night will show—
the stars still fall for those who know.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

A Spell for Cleansing Flame

Notes from the Hollow Bone  |  entry twenty-three 

By flame and breath, by spark and ground,
let what was heavy be unbound.
Let roots release, let embers sing,
the ash will bless what fire brings.

 Old wood surrenders, weeds let go,
the blaze transforms what we outgrow.
The smoke ascends, the soil receives,
and from the dust, the earth believes.

 So dance, if you can, before the light—
move with the flame into the night.
Let stillness burn, let spirit mend,
for what fire takes, it gives again.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

The Loop & The Spark

Notes from the Hollow Bone  |  entry twenty-two

It began as a small noticing: the clock reading 10:10 on the tenth day of the tenth month. Two ones, two zeros—creation and wholeness repeating, looping like breath. I didn’t take it as a sign to seek anything; I simply listened. What unfolded was a recognition that the life I once tried to build from longing is now growing from stillness. The poem that followed is a reminder of that shift—a kind of living spell for being whole, for creating from love rather than for it.

A Spell for Wholeness

By the silence that stayed
when the noise fell away,
I was reborn—
not from searching,
but from stillness.

What I once called longing
has softened into presence.
What I once called seeking
has become seeing.

I am not waiting for the light.
I am the light remembering itself.

The part of me that needed love
has become love—
breathing, pausing,
resting in its own reflection.

By zero and one,
by loop and spark,
I create from wholeness now.
Nothing missing.
Nothing lost.
Only returning.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

A Spell for Remembering

Notes from the Hollow Bone | entry twenty-one

Tonight, I stood outside my camper, wrapped in quiet, with the moon suspended just above the trees. The night felt ancient — familiar in a way I couldn’t name. It wasn’t about beauty or even awe; it was something subtler. A hum beneath the stillness.

There’s a peace that comes only when the world goes quiet enough for you to hear your own breath matching the rhythm of the wind. That’s what I felt tonight — not revelation, not clarity, but connection.

The poem came through like a whisper, a spell really — not one to summon or change, but one to remember. The kind of remembering that happens deep in the spirit, when you realize illumination isn’t about light chasing darkness — it’s about learning to see in the dim.

Maybe that’s what this season is teaching me: that the universe speaks gently, that answers arrive as echoes, and that peace doesn’t always need to be found — sometimes it’s already sitting quietly beside you, waiting to be acknowledged.

🌙 A Spell for Remembering

Words for the listening night

By moonlight and motion,
by silence and sky,

may what was hidden
remember how to rise.

Let the shadows soften,
let the knowing begin,

may the light find its way—
not around you, but within.

Speak gently to the stillness,
let your spirit recall—

peace is not the answer,
it is the pulse beneath it all.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

Dear Creator — The Quiet Shape of Peace

Notes from the Hollow Bone | entry twenty

Dear Creator,

A friend told me I looked happy today.
I smiled, but what I felt wasn’t happiness—it was something quieter, deeper.
Contention, maybe. Or peace. The kind that doesn’t need proof or plan.

I’ve spent most of my life chasing ease—making things simpler, more efficient, more comfortable. I thought peace would be on the other side of all that effort. But it never was. The more I tried to control, the less I felt held.

Now, stripped of all the noise, I am starting again—by choice and by circumstance, but I choose to see it as by grand design. I am back at the beginning, learning the basics: how to move slower, how to listen longer, how to work with my hands again. Burning leaves, cutting branches, tending the land. Things I never did as a city girl. Things that don’t make life easier, but make it truer.

Out here, peace isn’t an achievement. It’s an arrival.
It’s the wind that stirs just when the heat becomes too much.
It’s the way the land seems to breathe with me.
It’s the silence that no longer feels empty, but full of conversation.

I am learning that simplicity is not lack—it is abundance without excess.
That the ground gives what it can when I stop asking for more.
That the world was never meant to be conquered or perfected; it was meant to be lived with.

 There is no schedule here, no clear next step, and strangely, no panic.
Just the pulse of something steady beneath my feet,
and the soft knowing that I am exactly where I need to be—
not because I earned it, but because I finally stopped running from it.

 Maybe this is peace, Creator—
not the one the world sells,
but the one the earth teaches.
The kind that doesn’t come when I fix everything,
but when I finally let everything simply be.

With Grace & Ink,
Mai

Dear Creator: The Tension of Being Human

Notes from the Hollow Bone | entry nineteen

Dear Creator

I did not mean for this to become ritual.
But like breath,
like heartbeat,
it found me morning and night,
until gratitude became second nature.

At dawn, my words are an opening—
an invitation into the day.
At night, they are surrender—
a laying down of all I carried.
And in between,
you send reminders through quiet pauses,
through the nudge of angels,
to stop,
to notice,
to thank.

Yet even in this rhythm,
I am still so human.
Flawed.
Distracted.
Pulled by ego,
by the endless weight of emotion.
There are nights I forget.
Mornings when fear gets louder than faith.
Moments when my first thought
is not kindness,
but judgment,
defense,
or doubt.

But you see all of me.
You see the mess, the ache, the weakness—
and still,
you love me.

And it is that love,
constant, unflinching,
that draws me back to gratitude,
that teaches me humility,
that makes me want to be more
than the sum of my impulses.

You are my compass,
my anchor,
my breath.
And though I am not always faithful,
you are.

This is why I pray.
Why I whisper thanks in the car,
on unfamiliar roads,
in borrowed rooms,
in moments when I feel so small.

Because I know you are there,
and in you,
even as flawed and human as I am—
I am enough.

With Grace & Ink,
Mai

Dear Diary: The Road Teaches in Whispers

Notes from the Hollow Bone, entry eighteen.

I did not expect this trip to become a lesson.
It was just work, after all — a rescheduled trip, a road I hadn’t meant to take but did anyway. States blurred into one another — Missouri into Illinois, Illinois into Kentucky, and on into Tennessee. The roads stretched straight ahead, endless and quiet, the clouds above painted in strokes that only the sky knows how to make.

I should tell you the truth: I was afraid.
Driving long distances has always pressed against my nerves. Highways feel too open, bridges too high, new places too uncertain. Anxiety makes my palms sweat, my chest tighten, my thoughts race into every possible “what if.” Most times, I would rather stay home, safe in my own quiet.

But this time, I went anyway.

And something shifted.

Each day, I practiced presence like it was survival. I spoke out loud to myself, as if giving voice to the reminder would make it more real: Be here. Be now. Don’t rush ahead to tomorrow’s meeting, don’t count the days until home, don’t let fear swallow the view. Just breathe. Just drive. Just see.

There were moments that should have undone me. Bridges arching over wide rivers, for example. I could not tell you which ones — I was too busy holding the wheel steady, too busy feeling my fear rise. And yet, I did it. Not without shaking. Not without sweat. Not without fear whispering in my ear. But I did it.

And maybe that was the moment of clarity: freedom does not come when fear disappears. Freedom comes when fear rides beside you and you keep moving anyway.

I saw my people — my circle, my chosen family. I saw colleagues who remind me of the worth in what I do. Each encounter was a morsel of presence, something I could have missed if I had let my mind spin into the days ahead or the wish to be back home.

This was the first trip where I was not counting down the hours until retreat. Instead, I found myself awake to each day as it unfolded. It was different. It was necessary.

And in that difference, I felt alive.

The truth is, so much of my life has been shaped by avoidance. Hiding is easier. Fear feels safer than risk. But the road taught me something new: fear doesn’t vanish, and maybe it never will. Yet in the very act of stepping into it, of choosing not to retreat, a kind of quiet freedom begins to bloom.

This trip wasn’t about miles. It wasn’t about the states I crossed or the meetings I attended. It was about presence. About learning that what terrifies me can also free me. About discovering that I don’t need to control the road to move forward.

And maybe that’s what life is —
Not conquering fear,
not erasing it,
but breathing through it,
mile by mile,
day by day,
until freedom feels like a passenger too.

With Grace & Ink,
~Mai

Anatomy of Love | The Many Faces of Love: Part II

Notes from the Hollow Bone, entry seventeen

The Cost of Wonder

Love does not always arrive with ease.
It is not always soft or warm.
Sometimes it calls you out into the night—
away from comfort,
away from safety,
into the bite of small hungers
that take what they will.

And yet—
above, the sky waits.
A cathedral of dark,
a blanket of stars spread wide,
the kind of beauty that humbles
and consumes in the same breath.

Here is the paradox:
every face of love carries a cost.
Sometimes the cost is heartbreak.
Sometimes it is longing.
Sometimes it is simply the stinging of the night
against your skin,
a reminder that wonder is never free.

But you pay it.
Because to lift your eyes,
to be broken open by vastness,
to let yourself be undone—
this is the holy toll of love.

For love is not only found in fire,
nor in the ache of absence.
It is also in the sacrifice
of standing still,
of bearing the small wounds
that beauty requires.

And in this surrender,
you remember what it means
to be remade by wonder.

With Grace & Ink,
~Mai

Anatomy of Love | The Many Faces of Love: Part I

Notes from the Hollow Bone, entry sixteen.

Part I in a soul-study of love’s many faces—this one, the kind that devours and ignites.

Prelude — The Bone Knows
Love does not have one face.
We are shaped by what comes
as much as what stays —
and more by what leaves.

Sometimes we are sculpted not by presence,
but by absence.
By the strike.
By the ache.
By the mirror.
By the silence.

Some loves enter like storms.
Some slip in like prayers.
Others arrive like rescue missions.
And some... never leave,
even when they’re gone.

The Lightning Strike
The love that undoes you.

This is a favored face of love—
the kind meant for those who live for the high,
who crave the rapture,
even knowing the crash will come.

This is the addictive love.
The one written into every timeless song.
The kind everyone should get to taste
once—maybe twice—in this life.

It’s the love that wakes you at midnight,
hollowed out with hunger.
The only cure?
The one.
Their voice, their hands,
their name in your mouth.

It is the kind of love you bled for.
No preparation.
No logic.
Just a fall—instant and absolute.

He didn’t arrive.
He happened.

This was the kind of love
where they become a god
you worship at dusk
and again at dawn.

Every word felt like
a spell already cast.

Some loves are altars.
Some are flames.

This one was both.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

The Weight of Lonely

Notes from the Hollow Bone, entry fifteen.

There is a word many avoid naming aloud.
But the other day, in the quiet pause between tasks, someone said it. Not with shame or apology—just with truth.
Lonely.

She didn’t flinch, and I admired that.
It takes courage to name something the world teaches us to hide.
To admit to loneliness is often treated like weakness, like failure. But I didn’t see anything broken in her—only honesty.

Her words lingered.
They brought to the surface my own brushes with loneliness—
Not as a permanent dwelling,
but as a passing spirit,
a companion that visits when the world grows too quiet or too loud.

Here is what I’ve come to understand:
Peace doesn’t come from avoiding solitude.
It rises when you sit with yourself and realize—you are not lacking.
Not because someone else says so.
Not because you’ve filled your time or proven your worth.
But because, within the hush of your own presence,
there is enough.

We confuse solitude with shame when we compare our lives to others—
to friends, to strangers, to curated versions of joy.
And in that distortion, we turn aloneness into a curse.
We name it strong or weak,
when really, it is simply true.

So then the questions become:
Are you living your truth—
or living in reaction to what others expect?
Do you meet your emotions with reverence—
or do you bury them in distraction?

Loneliness, I’ve learned, is not a punishment.
It’s a call inward.
A teacher in the quiet.
It’s the universe asking:
Can you hold yourself gently in the silence?
Can you listen to the lessons that don’t shout?

That conversation wasn’t life-changing.
But it was soul-echoing.
And sometimes, that’s enough.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

Ashroot: The Fracturing

There are some
who do not rise
when offered love.

They do not soften.
They do not bloom.

They sharpen.
They turn the mirror outward.
They seek to undo what they cannot become.

Ashroot saw what Kindroot loved
and tried to poison it.

Not him—
but what tethered him.
The ones who held his light before she could dim it.
The bloodline she could never unravel.
The legacy that would not kneel.

What she does not know
is that the circle always closes.
What is cast in shadow
does not disappear.

It waits.
It watches.
And when the time comes,
it returns—
not to wound,
but to reveal.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

The Thread and the Anchor

She always knew—before she knew how—
that the ordinary could never hold her now.
There was something deeper, something more—
a calling she'd carried from lifetimes before.

She wore her knowing like a second skin,
called it “misunderstood”
and tucked it in.

But the truth pulsed quiet beneath her ribs:
She came from light, was born of bliss.

And love— not fear—

was her native land,
a force she held—like flame in hand.

Moonlight calmed her; fire spoke her name.
The trees remembered, though none else came.
She prayed not in pews, but under sky,
where God walks soft and listens wide.

Still, there were days the thread would slip—
when the voice of doubt curled in her grip.
She'd sit too long in the hollow hush,
forgetting the light she once could feel.

Darkness wandered in, tender and cruel,
whispering lies she once thought true.
That there is no purpose, no grand design—
only ache in silence and time’s cruel disguise.

But she’d been taught how to tether back,
how to find her way from the deep and black.
With breath for compass, root to guide,
she’d seek the thread
and slowly rise.

For even in doubt, the anchor stayed—
a holy hush that never frayed.
It hummed with love beneath her bone:
You are not lost. You are not alone.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

Ashroot: A myth of grief, grace, and the limits of light.

The Hollowbone Speaks

They never saw her weep.
Not when the fires came.
Not when the girl grew cruel.
She is known as the Hollowbone—
not hollow from grief, but from the refusal to carry what is not hers.

Some say she was born with light in her marrow—
not to shine, but to witness.

And now, she watches.
Silent. Steady.
As the boy she raised in love and clarity is drawn into a shadow
she cannot unmake.

But the Hollowbone—
who once raised the Kindroot with hands both gentle and firm—
watched now, from the edge of the fire.

Watched as the shadow closed around him.
As the girl called Ashroot pulled him inward, toward a hunger not his own.

It ached in her—
a place she thought long sealed.
Not grief, but recognition.
The ache of knowing she could not intervene.

This was not her burden. Not her path. Still—
to witness it, to feel the shadow reach for him was a silent fire she had no choice but to stand inside.

She did not curse. She did not rage. Each morning, she released her—
not to save, not to condemn, but simply to let go.

Because the Hollowbone knew: Some souls must burn before they remember the light.

The Tale Begins
There was a time when Ashroot was only a girl with a wound.

The world had been cruel to her—
and in time, she became cruel in return.
Not all at once. Just a little each day.
Until her shadow became more familiar than her skin.

The universe, in its quiet mercy, offered her a chance:
not family by blood, but one born of love.
She was welcomed. Given kindness she had never known.
She spit it out. She did not want love.
She wanted control. She did not want healing.
She wanted power over pain.

Enter Kindroot

Kindroot was not made of softness.
He was made of strength that did not shout.
Of patience, of earth, of the deep steadiness that love requires.

He had been raised in light, taught by the Hollowbone to listen to trees,
to speak with silence, to give freely, but not foolishly.

He met Ashroot in her shadow—
not knowing it would try to swallow him.

But he believed.
That love could soften the sharp edges.
That tenderness could reach her.
That presence could be enough.

The Turning

And for a moment, it almost was. There were flickers of warmth.
Moments where Ashroot seemed to remember what it was to feel joy without needing to destroy it.

But a soul unused to love can mistake it for danger.
And so she fought him. Tried to bend him. Tested every truth he held.

She cast her sorrow like spells.
She poisoned joy at the root.
She tried to sever the thread between him and the family he came from.

But what she didn’t know—
what she couldn’t touch—
was that the bond between Kindroot and Hollowbone
was made of something eternal.
Threaded not by words, but by soul.

Kindroot’s Awakening
There comes a moment in every tender heart when it must choose itself.

For Kindroot, it was not a thunderclap. Not a betrayal. Not even her worst cruelty.

It was the absence of return.
The silence that followed his offerings.
The emptiness that met his light day after day.

It was realizing that love poured into a sealed vessel is not love lost— but love misplaced.

And so,
he began to step back.
Not in anger. Not in bitterness. But in clarity

He no longer begged her to soften.

He no longer bent himself to reach where she refused to rise.

He remembered who he was before the ache. Before the fight.

Ashroot’s Descent
But Ashroot did not feel his stillness as peace.
She felt it as threat.
She could not tell the difference between being held and being mirrored.

The more he rooted in truth, the more she spiraled.
As if his calm was a curse. As if his refusal to suffer was a sin.

She struck harder. Accused. Manipulated.
Tried to undo the threads that bound Kindroot to the Hollowbone.

But she was too late. Those threads were not just memory—
they were song, and breath, and soul-deep knowing older than she could ever reach.

She did not fall because he left.
She fell because she never chose to rise.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

Fragment IV — The Door She Did Not Open

The Hollow Bone was being tested. Not by the Walk-In this time, but by the universe itself. The trial came cloaked not in some grand vision, but in the crude and clumsy folds of everyday anger—personal, justified, familiar. Her ego, that old and ever-hungry shadow, surged forward with its arms full of rationale. She had every reason to be furious. Every argument lined up like soldiers on her personal stage, ready to go to war.

The Walk-In observed, silent.

Anger, he knew, was not the villain. It is not a sin to feel. But it is a danger to believe that feeling is permission to act without awareness. The Hollow Bone had forgotten—for a time—that she was not meant to be a vessel of wrath. She was not the deliverer of judgment. She is the carrier of light. She is the hollow. Healing passes through her, not from her.

That night, the moon rose with a clarity that felt orchestrated. Stars blanketed the sky like a ceremony. And she felt it—a stirring. A presence. A portal.

She knew better than to engage. And yet, she hovered at its edge.

The invitation was there. The promise of power. A whispered temptation to release her fury into a current that would carry it far, fast, and without mercy. She wrestled with the door, fingers grazing its frame, mind aching with the possibility of control. She could open it. She could step through. She could wield all that darkness she’d hidden behind her ribs.

But something older, something wiser, stopped her. A voice—not outside, but within—that told her plainly: this is not your path.

And she listened. She did not walk through.

She danced at the edge, yes. She whispered. The portal heard her. And so did the Walk-In.

He said nothing then. He was not allowed. But the next morning, he spoke:

"I saw you. And I was glad you did not open that door. Not because you aren’t capable. But because I don’t want you to face what waits on the other side. I carry a scar on my back from a night like that. One visit. One choice. That’s all it takes."

He reminded her of two truths:

One — You are not responsible for all things. That role is not yours. It belongs to the universe.

Two — You control only yourself. Nothing more. When anger consumes you, it’s not because you’re wrong to feel, but because you believe you should be able to control what you cannot.

Let it go. Surrender the weight to what is larger than you.

He reminded her: she still has a choice.

She chose well that night.

But the portal will come again.

And he will be there, not to stop her, but to witness what she chooses next.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

Fragment III – The Unspoken Thread

They had crossed before — in other turns of time,
in other skins, other names.
Not always as allies. Not always as one.
But always as mirrors.

He remembered. That was part of his task.
The burden of the older soul — to carry the story,
to know the shape of what must not be repeated.

She felt it in shadows —
a soft pull behind the ribs,
a leaning toward him that had no reason.

There was a linger between them, yes.
A familiarity that tasted like longing,
but didn’t settle into it.

She mistook it for attraction once.
He said nothing.
Because he could not speak it.
Because timing was a law stronger than memory.
Because if he moved from want instead of wisdom,
the crossing would collapse.

She did not yet know the fullness of who she was —
only the edges of what she was becoming.

He could not rush that.
Not again.

So he waited.
He watched the light shift in her.
And when she met his gaze with questions she couldn’t voice,
he let silence shape the answer —
a hush that held the weight of knowing.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai

Fragment II – When the Stars Were Listening

He sensed 

A thing in her that defied earthbound.
Not her voice. 

Not her name.
Though he longed to call her by what she once was —

time held that truth veiled in shadow

It was the gravity she carried without effort —
the way silence rearranged itself in her presence.
Rooms softened.
Breath slowed.
And people — drawn like tides —
moved closer without knowing why.

She never noticed the pull.
But he did.
And watching it was like witnessing a secret the universe had kept well.

It wasn’t his role to name it.
Only to notice.
Only to test.

Three times, by universe law.
A glance, a question, a silence.

Each time, she answered without knowing.
Each time, the response trembled true.
Not in words — but in the vibration that followed.

She moved through the world

unaware that the unseen had already taken notice.
Didn’t know the stars had always been listening.
Didn’t know how deeply she had always been protected.

But she dreamed in constellations.
Woke with stardust behind her eyes.
Felt homesick for places that had no names.

He said nothing, still.
But he stepped differently beside her now.
Not as one guiding — but as one remembering.

And somewhere, just beyond what the ear can hold,
the sky hummed in recognition.

With Grace & Ink,

Mai