Borrowed Rooms And Belonging

She saved me
Or so I told myself every time I saw her
Because I needed to believe it

She took me in when I had no one
When silence was louder than my own name
She comforted me in her own quiet ways

For a moment I truly thought I belonged
But belonging is fragile when it only lives
In borrowed rooms and borrowed moments

It feels real until you realize
It was never yours to keep
It fades before you notice it slipping away
And suddenly you are an outsider again

To her I was one of many
Welcome, but never essential or chosen
Not important enough to be considered
When choices were made
Or for her to protect our fragile friendship

Now she sleeps beside the very thing
I once cried to her about
She says we are good, doesn’t see the shift
Because she never lost anything; I did

The friends I called mine,
Were always borrowed; they were hers not mine
They came through her and stayed with her

I am grateful
For the moments they held me together
But I will forever grieve what I thought was mine

And I am learning to accept
What it means to exist in borrowed rooms