Some poems start with an idea.
Others start with a line you’ve known so long that you almost don’t hear the words anymore.
“Twinkle, twinkle, little star…”
It’s one of the first songs a lot of us learn as children. We sing it before we know what stars actually are. Before we understand distance. Before we understand that the light reaching us might have been traveling for years.
And before we learn that sometimes, the thing we’re looking at may already be gone.
That thought stuck with me.
Because there’s something strangely human about that.
So I followed it.
And it got darker than the nursery rhyme. 😅
Little Star
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
I used to wonder
what you are.
Before I learned
that some lights
are already dead.
That sometimes
we spend our whole lives
looking at something
that disappeared
centuries ago.
No one tells children that.
We point toward the sky
and call it beautiful.
Make wishes
on burning things.
Teach them
to close their eyes
and ask the universe
for whatever
their tiny hearts desire.
I wonder
how many wishes
were sent
to something
that wasn’t there
to receive them.
Maybe that’s why
mine never came true.
I used to lie
beneath my blankets
and watch the stars
through my window.
I thought
they were watching back.
Guardians.
Tiny holes in heaven
letting the light through.
I didn’t know yet
that darkness
was the natural state
of things.
That light
had to fight
just to reach us.
Sometimes,
I still look up.
Not to wish.
I stopped doing that
a long time ago.
Now I count
the dead things
still shining.
One.
Two.
Three.
There are too many.
And I wonder
how long
a person can disappear
before everyone else
notices
their light
is only a memory.
How many times
have I smiled
after something inside me
had already gone dark?
How many people
have looked at me
and thought,
She’s doing so well.
Because they were seeing
light
that left me
years ago?
Maybe we are all
a little like stars.
Carrying old versions
of ourselves
across impossible distances.
Letting people
make wishes
on pieces of us
that no longer exist.
Twinkle, twinkle,
little star.
I finally know
what you are.
Proof
that something
doesn’t have to be alive
for its absence
to take years
to reach us.
Between the Lines
What got me about the idea behind this poem wasn’t really the stars.
It was the delay.
The idea that light can keep traveling after its source has changed—or disappeared entirely.
And I started thinking about how often people do that, too.
There are versions of ourselves that other people continue to see long after we’ve stopped being them.
Maybe they remember the version of you who tolerated things you don’t tolerate anymore.
The version who trusted more easily.
The version who was louder.
Softer.
Happier.
More naive.
Maybe they’re looking at who you were five years ago and assuming that person is still standing in front of them.
And sometimes, it happens in reverse.
Sometimes we’re the ones sending out old light.
We smile.
We go to work.
We answer messages.
We make jokes.
We tell people we’re fine.
And from where everyone else is standing, we might genuinely look fine.
They aren’t necessarily ignoring what’s happening inside us.
They may simply be seeing the light that reached them.
That’s where the line—
How many people
have looked at me
and thought,
She’s doing so well.
—came from.
There’s something sad about realizing that someone can look directly at you and still be seeing an older version of you.
But I don’t think Little Star is entirely about sadness.
I think it’s also about change.
We spend our lives leaving versions of ourselves behind.
Some disappear quietly.
Some take years to let go of.
Some probably still exist in somebody else’s memory exactly as we were when they last knew us.
And maybe that’s okay.
Because the person I was isn’t necessarily gone just because I’m not her anymore.
Some of her light made it here.
I carry pieces of her.
Other people carry pieces of her.
And someday, the person I am right now will probably become another one of those distant versions too.
Still visible.
Still affecting something.
Just no longer the whole story.
Maybe that’s what I like most about the stars.
We look up and think we’re seeing what is.
Sometimes we’re actually seeing what was.
And unless we look a little closer, we may never know the difference.
Until next time,
—Destiny
P.S. Some things keep shining long after they’ve changed. Maybe people do, too.
destinylaharris 