destinylaharris

Category: Between the Lines

  • Between the Lines #5: Monsters

    I used to think growing up meant learning that monsters weren’t real.

    Monsters

    As we got older,
    the monsters crept from under our beds
    to inside our heads.

    We stopped checking closets.

    Stopped leaving
    the hallway light on.

    Stopped pulling blankets
    over our faces
    because someone told us

    there was nothing there.

    And we believed them.

    For a while.

    We laughed
    at the children we used to be.

    Afraid of shadows.

    Afraid of footsteps.

    Afraid of something
    reaching from beneath the bed
    and grabbing our ankles.

    We didn’t know yet

    that monsters grow up too.

    They stop hiding
    beneath mattresses

    and start answering
    to ordinary names.

    Anxiety.

    Grief.

    Shame.

    Trauma.

    Loneliness.

    The voice that says
    everyone you love
    will eventually leave.

    The memory
    that waits until 2 a.m.
    to remind you
    it never really went anywhere.

    The fear
    that maybe you are difficult to love.

    The thought
    that everyone else
    was given instructions
    for being alive

    and somehow
    yours got lost.

    As children,

    we could run
    to another room.

    Climb into someone’s bed.

    Whisper,

    “I’m scared.”

    And sometimes
    that was enough.

    Someone would check the closet.

    Look beneath the bed.

    Turn on the light.

    Promise us

    nothing was there.

    God,

    I miss when fear
    could be proven wrong
    with a flashlight.

    Because now

    the monster knows my name.

    It knows my history.

    It knows exactly
    which memories
    to pull from the shelf

    when I am finally
    having a good day.

    It knows
    which insecurities
    still have teeth.

    It knows how to sound
    exactly like me.

    That’s the cruelest part.

    Eventually,

    you stop knowing

    which thoughts
    belong to you

    and which ones
    belong to the monster.

    So I became
    my own night-light.

    My own open door.

    My own voice
    in the darkness saying,

    “There’s nothing there.”

    Even when
    I wasn’t sure.

    Especially when
    I wasn’t sure.

    As we got older,

    the monsters crept
    from under our beds

    to inside our heads.

    And maybe growing up

    was never about
    discovering

    that monsters
    aren’t real.

    Maybe it was realizing

    no one else

    can check beneath the bed

    for us anymore.

    So now,

    when the darkness comes,

    I sit beside
    the frightened child
    still living inside me.

    I take her hand.

    I turn on the light.

    And together,

    we remind the monsters

    that this time—

    they’re the ones

    who should be afraid of us.

    Between the Lines

    When I was little, monsters were easy.

    Not necessarily less scary—but easier.

    They lived under beds.

    Inside closets.

    In dark hallways.

    Behind doors that looked completely harmless during the day but somehow became suspicious as hell once the lights went out.

    And when you were scared, you could call for someone.

    Someone bigger would come into the room, turn on the light, open the closet, look underneath the bed, and show you there was nothing there.

    Fear could be proven wrong.

    I think that’s what sits underneath this poem more than anything else.

    God, I miss when fear could be proven wrong with a flashlight.

    Because somewhere along the way, the monsters changed.

    They stopped having claws and shadows and glowing eyes.

    They became things like anxiety.

    Grief.

    Shame.

    Trauma.

    Loneliness.

    Memories.

    The things we tell ourselves when it’s late and everything feels heavier than it did during the day.

    And nobody can walk into the room and prove those things aren’t there.

    Nobody can shine a flashlight underneath your thoughts.

    That might be one of the cruelest parts of growing up.

    But while writing this poem, I realized something else.

    When I was a child, I needed someone else to turn on the light.

    Now I can do it myself.

    Not always.

    Not perfectly.

    And sometimes I turn it on with shaking hands.

    But I can sit beside the younger versions of myself who are still scared. I can remind them that we survived the things we once thought we wouldn’t. I can question the voice that tells me every fear is a fact simply because it sounds like my own.

    Maybe that’s part of growing up, too.

    Not becoming fearless.

    Not finally reaching some magical age where the monsters disappear.

    Just learning that when they come back, you don’t have to hide beneath the blankets anymore.

    You can turn on the light yourself.

    And maybe, eventually, the monsters learn to be afraid of you.

    Until next time,

    —Destiny

    P.S. What was the thing you were most afraid of in the dark when you were a kid?

  • Between the Lines #4: When the Wind Carries Secrets

    Some things are easier to say when you don’t know who’s listening.

    When the wind carries secrets,
    I wonder if mine
    are still looking for me.

    I have whispered so many things
    into the open air—
    names I no longer say aloud,
    prayers that never reached heaven,
    apologies that belonged
    to someone else.

    I imagine the wind
    keeping them all.

    Tucking them beneath its ribs,
    carrying them over oceans,
    through forests,
    past houses where little girls
    still believe their mothers
    will always protect them.

    Maybe that’s why
    it never stops moving.

    Maybe grief
    has made it too heavy
    to rest.

    I have secrets
    that still wake before I do.

    Secrets that smell like hospitals
    and old bedrooms.

    Secrets that remember
    what my body spent years
    trying to forget.

    I don’t think silence
    buries anything.

    I think it teaches memories
    how to echo.

    Sometimes the wind
    finds me again.

    It slips through cracked windows.
    Lifts my hair from my shoulders.
    Whispers my own voice
    back to me—

    only older.

    Softer.

    Like someone
    who survived the telling.

    I wonder
    how many of us
    are breathing
    the same air.

    How many confessions
    have passed through my lungs.

    How many mothers
    never heard the words
    their children carried.

    How many lovers
    mistook silence
    for peace.

    The wind knows.

    It has listened
    to every goodbye
    spoken too late.

    Every I’m sorry
    that arrived
    after the damage.

    Every I love you
    that died
    on the tip of a tongue.

    When the wind carries secrets,

    I hope it carries this one gently—

    I survived.

    Not gracefully.

    Not without breaking.

    But enough

    that I can finally say it

    without whispering.

    And maybe,

    just maybe,

    the wind isn’t carrying my secrets away.

    Maybe

    it’s carrying them

    to someone

    who thought

    they were the only one.

    I think some things become harder to say the longer we carry them.

    Eventually, they stop feeling like words and start feeling like weight.

    That’s where this poem came from.

    I liked the idea of the wind as something that has heard everything—the things we whispered when nobody was around, the apologies we never received, the words we never managed to say, and the stories we spent years keeping quiet.

    But somewhere while writing it, the wind stopped feeling like something that was taking secrets away.

    It started feeling like something connecting us.

    Because maybe the things we’re convinced we have to carry quietly aren’t as uniquely ours as we think.

    Maybe somewhere, someone else has whispered the same thing.

    And maybe surviving something doesn’t always mean being able to talk about it loudly.

    Sometimes being able to finally say, “I survived,” without whispering is enough.

    Until next time,

    —Destiny

    P.S. If the wind could carry away one thing you’ve never been able to say out loud, would you let it?

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  • Between the Lines #3

    Dinner With My Fears

    Tonight,

    I sat at a table
    with all of my fears.

    There wasn’t enough room.

    Failure arrived first,
    still wearing my face.

    She smiled politely,
    asked if I’d finally accepted
    that I’ll never become
    everything I dreamed of.

    Before I could answer,

    Grief pulled out a chair.

    She didn’t say much.

    She never does.

    She just looked at me
    like we’d known each other
    for years.

    We have.

    Self-doubt
    wouldn’t stop talking.

    Every sentence
    ended with a question mark.

    Are you sure?

    What if you’re wrong?

    What if they leave
when they finally know you?

    Loneliness laughed.

    Not because anything was funny.

    Because she’d already heard
    this conversation before.

    Fear of failure
    ordered another drink.

    Fear of being forgotten
    kept checking the door
    to see if anyone else
    was coming.

    No one did.

    Then…

    Abandonment arrived.

    The room changed.

    Every fear went quiet.

    Even Grief
    looked away.

    She sat across from me
    like she’d always owned
    that chair.

    She didn’t have to introduce herself.

    I’ve known her
    since I was little.

    She folded her hands
    and asked,

    “How much of yourself
did you give away today
just to make someone stay?”

    I didn’t answer.

    She smiled.

    She already knew.

    She reminded me
    of every apology
    I never owed.

    Every boundary
    I called selfish.

    Every version of myself
    I buried alive
    so someone else
    wouldn’t feel uncomfortable.

    She spoke the longest.

    The others
    hardly interrupted.

    Because every fear
    at that table

    had learned its language
    from her.

    Failure said,

    “You’ll disappoint them.”

    Self-doubt whispered,

    “You’re too much.”

    Loneliness added,

    “No one stays forever.”

    Even Grief nodded.

    They were all saying
    the same thing.

    Just with different mouths.

    I sat there

    listening.

    Until something strange happened.

    A chair scraped the floor.

    Hope.

    Late as always.

    She looked exhausted.

    Like she’d fought traffic
    just to get here.

    She sat beside me,

    not across from me.

    She didn’t argue
    with my fears.

    She simply reached
    for my hand.

    And for the first time
    all evening—

    Abandonment

    stopped talking.

    Because maybe

    the loudest voice
    at the table

    was never the truest one.

    Maybe it was just

    the oldest.

    — Destiny

    A little between the lines…

    I think fear has a way of disguising itself.

    Sometimes it calls itself failure.

    Sometimes loneliness.

    Sometimes self-doubt.

    Sometimes it convinces us that making ourselves smaller is easier than risking someone walking away.

    But if you listen long enough, sometimes you realize all those voices learned how to speak from the same place.

    I wanted this poem to give those voices bodies.

    To sit them around a table.

    To let them talk.

    And then, eventually, to let Hope pull up a chair.

    Not because Hope magically makes fear disappear.

    She doesn’t even argue with it.

    She just sits beside you.

    Sometimes that’s enough to make the oldest voice in the room a little quieter.

    Until next time,
    — Destiny

    P.S. If your fears had a seat at the table, which one would talk the most? 🖤

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  • Between the Lines #2

    Darkness, My Old Friend

    I am completely at peace as darkness wraps me in her sweet embrace.

    I’m not scared.

    I’m not worried.

    I have no apprehension for what’s to come.

    I welcome her like an old friend.

    We sit together.

    We talk.

    We dream about all the could bes and what ifs.

    She listens without interruption.

    She understands without explanation.

    With her, I can be completely honest about who I am.

    There are no expectations.

    No judgments.

    Only acceptance.

    “Just breathe,” she whispers each night as she wraps her arms around me, and for a little while, the rest of the world disappears.

    Together, we become one.

    Every night, without fail, she finds her way back to me.

    And every night, we begin another adventure.

    Then morning comes.

    “Be at peace,” she reminds me as daylight slowly loosens her grip.

    She never leaves with sadness.

    Only with the quiet promise that she’ll return.

    And she always does.

    Until next time…

    Darkness, my old friend.

    I’ll be missing you.

    — Destiny

    P.S. If this poem spoke to you, I’d love to know what it means to you. I think poetry is at its best when every reader finds something different between the lines. 🖤

  • Between the Lines #1

    I wrote this before this blog ever existed.

    It was tucked away in one of my notebooks, waiting for the right place to live.

    I think it found that place here.

    Scars

    The gods always asked

    for sacrifices.

    Some were given lambs.

    Some were given daughters.

    I was given myself.

    No temple stood above me,

    no choir sang my name,

    yet something holy

    was taken all the same.

    Every pale line

    is another language

    my body learned

    instead of peace.

    The ones across my legs

    look like rivers

    on an old map—

    proof that even broken things

    search for somewhere

    to belong.

    People ask

    if I regret them.

    As if regret

    could erase history.

    As if skin

    ever forgets

    the knife,

    the fingernails,

    the hands that held too tightly,

    the nights that stole

    more than sleep.

    My skin is carved with scars

    that someone else earned.

    Not mine.

    Mine was only the body

    left behind

    after their hands,

    their words,

    their silence

    had already decided

    what would become of it.

    My skin was never sacred.

    It was only the altar.

    They called it survival.

    The gods

    would have called it

    an offering.

    Maybe that’s why

    I no longer pray

    for smooth skin.

    I pray instead

    for gentler hands,

    for quieter nights,

    for a body

    that no longer mistakes

    silence

    for safety.

    If the gods ever come looking

    for the pieces

    they abandoned,

    they’ll find them here—

    written beneath my skin,

    where every scar

    became a sentence,

    every sentence

    became a story,

    and somewhere along the way,

    I stopped being

    the sacrifice.

    I became

    the monument.

    Until next time,

    — Destiny

    P.S. Which line stayed with you the longest?