Not Mine To Keep

Not mine to keep—
I didn’t mean for you to matter,
you were just meant to quiet the evenings,
to sit beside the loneliness
in a town that didn’t know my name.

But you became warmth—
the kind that settles into the body,
the kind that makes restless nerves go still.
Not mine to keep.

I learned the shape of you in ordinary things—
car rides, half-finished conversations,
the way silence didn’t feel empty
when you were in it.
Not mine to keep.

I didn’t ask for forever—
I just forgot there wasn’t one.
Not mine to keep.

Now nights are colder—
not just the air,
but the space where you used to be
without me having to ask.
Not mine to keep.

And it hurts in places
I can’t explain—
in my chest, in my thoughts,
in the quiet moments that stretch too long.
Not mine to keep.

I think of giving—
a blanket, a phone, a reason to return—
as if kindness could rewrite
what truth has already said.
Not mine to keep.

You belonged to another life,
one I could only glimpse in shadows—
in missed calls,
in stories that didn’t quite add up,
in a world that existed just beyond me.
Not mine to keep.

Still, what I felt was real—
the calm, the closeness,
the way my guard slipped
without me noticing.
Not mine to keep.

And now I sit with the absence of it,
learning slowly, painfully,
that peace shouldn’t come
from someone who also breaks it.
Not mine to keep.

So I let you go—
not because I didn’t feel enough,
but because feeling wasn’t enough to stay.
Not mine to keep.

And maybe one day
this ache will soften into something quieter—
not forgetting,
but understanding.

That I was not nothing.
I was simply
loving in the wrong place.
Not mine to keep..