All Roads Lead Me Back To You

i have been fighting it for so long that i can no longer remember who i was before this—before you.

there was a time i moved through the world lightly, untouched by the weight of wanting, unbothered by the way things unfold. that version of me feels distant now, like a place i can no longer return to.

now there is an ache lodged deep in my chest, its grip steady and unrelenting. it feels like something pulled from the bottom of a river, rising slowly, pressing through the depths of my soul until it becomes impossible to ignore. i try to hold it down, to quiet it, but it keeps finding its way back to the surface, asking to be felt, to be named.

i have tried to outrun it. i have taken paths that promised distance, convinced myself that there were directions i could go where you would not follow. but every road bends in ways i do not expect, every turn leads me somewhere familiar, somewhere i have already been.

and no matter how far i go, or how long i resist, i always find myself here again—standing at the same place, holding the same truth.

all roads lead me back to you.