Hold On, Just a Little Longer
by Crystal Craig

There is a courtroom inside me,
where logic, instinct, emotion, and spirit
each plead their case,
in languages I almost understand.

i do not choose sides.
i dissolve.

pulled between motion and stillness,
between the command to run
and the longing to stay.

between the safety of silence
and the wild thrum of wanting more.

when asked what I desire,
I reach into the noise
and come back with a single word—
peace.

not as aspiration,
but as surrender.

I am torn into neutrality,
a passive witness to my own life.

to cry would be too revealing.
to laugh, too loud.
to scream, too late.

so I become the quiet.

do not mistake it for serenity.
it is the hush before the collapse.

a sacred pause
where my humanity still clings
to the thinnest thread
and whispers...

"hold on, just a little longer."