There are some things you know are bad for you before you ever touch them.
That doesn’t always stop you from wanting them.
I think we like to imagine that once we’ve learned a lesson, we become immune to repeating it.
Once you know what a red flag looks like, you’ll never walk toward one again.
Once you’ve survived the fire, surely you’ll recognize the heat next time.
Except people don’t really work like that.
Sometimes you know exactly what something is—
and it still sounds beautiful.
That’s where this poem came from.
Not from being unable to recognize danger.
From recognizing it perfectly and having to decide whether you’re going to listen anyway.
This is Song of the Sirens.
Song of the Sirens
He smiled like sin itself,
and I forgot how to pray.
Not because I stopped believing.
Because some songs
are louder than faith.
They never tell you
the Sirens don’t force anyone.
They simply sing.
The rest
is a decision.
I saw the rocks.
I knew the stories.
I knew how endings like this
always ended.
Bodies drifting.
Dreams swallowed whole.
Women like me
mistaking hunger
for destiny.
Still—
I stepped closer.
There is something terrifying
about wanting the thing
you already know
will undo you.
Not because you’re foolish.
Because loneliness
has a remarkable way
of making shipwrecks
look like shorelines.
His smile carried the same promise
the sea always has.
Come closer.
You’ll finally understand.
You won’t feel alone here.
I almost believed him.
Almost mistook
being desired
for being seen.
Almost confused
chemistry
with safety.
He smiled like sin itself,
and somewhere in the distance
the Sirens started singing.
Not with voices.
With possibility.
With every version of my life
that might have existed
if I had ignored
what my heart already knew.
People think temptation
looks like certainty.
It doesn’t.
It looks like curiosity.
One more conversation.
One more touch.
One more reason
to believe this time
will be different.
The ocean never asks
for all of you at once.
It takes you
one step at a time.
I stood at the water’s edge
long enough
to hear the music.
Long enough
to understand
why sailors kept turning the ship.
Long enough
to know
I wasn’t immune.
Then I remembered—
love had already taught me
the difference
between a lighthouse
and a fire.
One guides you home.
The other only looks beautiful
from far away.
So I walked away.
Not because the song stopped.
It didn’t.
I walked away
because I finally understood
that surviving
sometimes sounds like
leaving the music
unfinished.
Between the Lines
This poem uses Sirens, but it isn’t really about Sirens.
There’s no monster waiting on the rocks.
No sailor tied to a mast.
No literal song floating across the ocean.
The Siren in this poem is possibility.
It’s that dangerous little voice that asks:
But what if?
What if this one is different?
What if I’m reading it wrong?
What if I just stay a little longer?
What if the thing that hurt me before could somehow become the thing that heals me now?
And sometimes that question is enough to make us move closer to something we already know we should be walking away from.
“They simply sing. The rest is a decision.”
I really wanted this line in the poem because I didn’t want temptation to become something that happened to her.
The Sirens aren’t dragging her into the ocean.
She sees the rocks.
She knows the stories.
She understands exactly what could happen.
And she still takes a step.
That distinction matters.
Because sometimes we talk about destructive patterns like we somehow lose all agency the second temptation appears.
But there’s usually a space between hearing the song and reaching the rocks.
Sometimes it’s tiny.
Sometimes it’s painful.
But it’s there.
And that’s where the decision lives.
“Loneliness has a remarkable way of making shipwrecks look like shorelines.”
This is probably the line that sits closest to the center of the poem for me.
Because loneliness changes perspective.
Something doesn’t necessarily become safer just because you’re lonely.
It can just start looking safer.
Attention feels more meaningful.
Chemistry feels more important.
Being wanted starts feeling suspiciously similar to being understood.
And suddenly something you would have recognized immediately from a distance begins looking like somewhere you could rest.
That’s why the next lines matter too:
Almost mistook
being desired
for being seen.
Almost confused
chemistry
with safety.
Those things are not interchangeable.
Someone can want you without knowing you.
You can have incredible chemistry with somebody who is terrible for you.
Something can feel intense without being healthy.
And sometimes learning that difference is expensive.
Temptation doesn’t usually arrive screaming.
I think we picture bad decisions as these huge dramatic moments.
You stand at a crossroads.
One path says GOOD IDEA.
The other says THIS WILL RUIN YOUR LIFE.
Then you knowingly choose disaster.
😂
Usually it’s much quieter than that.
One more conversation.
One more touch.
One more reason
to believe this time
will be different.
That’s how people end up farther into something than they ever planned to go.
The ocean doesn’t ask for all of you at once.
One step.
Then another.
Then another.
Eventually you look behind you and realize the shoreline is much farther away than you thought.
That part of the poem isn’t really about one person.
It’s about patterns.
The ways we negotiate with ourselves when we want something badly enough.
The tiny permissions that become much bigger decisions.
“I wasn’t immune.”
I really like that she doesn’t walk away because she becomes stronger than the song.
She doesn’t suddenly stop wanting it.
She doesn’t stand at the water and think:
Wow. I can’t believe I ever considered that.
She understands why sailors turned their ships.
She understands exactly why someone would keep listening.
And she realizes she could too.
There’s something more honest to me about that than pretending growth means temptation stops working.
Sometimes growth is knowing:
This could still get me.
And making a different decision anyway.
The lighthouse and the fire.
love had already taught me
the difference
between a lighthouse
and a fire.
One guides you home.
The other only looks beautiful
from far away.
This is the moment where the poem changes.
Up until then, she is measuring the danger against desire.
Then she remembers she has something else to compare it to.
Not fantasy.
Not possibility.
Experience.
She knows what it feels like when love is safe.
And once you know that, intensity stops being quite as convincing.
A fire can be beautiful.
Warm.
Mesmerizing.
You can stare at it forever.
That doesn’t mean you should walk into it.
A lighthouse doesn’t ask you to burn.
It helps you find your way home.
Leaving the Music Unfinished
The ending matters to me because the song never stops.
I didn’t want it to.
If the Sirens suddenly went silent, walking away wouldn’t mean very much.
Of course she leaves if she no longer wants to stay.
That isn’t the difficult choice.
She leaves while she can still hear them.
While possibility still exists.
While some part of her still wonders what would happen if she took one more step.
There’s no neat ending.
No final conversation.
No satisfying answer to every what if.
She doesn’t stay long enough to learn how the story would have ended.
And that’s the point.
Sometimes we think closure means finishing something.
Getting the answer.
Having the conversation.
Following it all the way through so we can finally know.
But sometimes survival requires accepting that you are never going to know.
Sometimes the safest ending is the one you deliberately refuse to finish.
The song keeps playing.
You just stop following it.
Until next time,
— Destiny
P.S. Have you ever had to walk away from something even though part of you still wanted it? 🖤
