An ode To J

“You Came to Me a Boy”
By MissT. (POEM)

I didn’t know love.
Not the kind that stays,
not the kind that doesn’t ask
for blood in return.

I didn’t know it could be easy,
until you.

Every blade that had lived in my chest,
every betrayal I stitched into my skin,
melted when you walked in—
light, laughing,
alive.

You were so young.
So clean.
No scars yet, no sad songs.
Just the pulse of life
beating through you.

I laughed at you.
How could I not?
You were too young for the war stories I carried.
Too young for the nights I couldn’t sleep.

But you—
you were wiser
than all my broken pieces.

You stayed.
You smiled.
You cooked roast dinners and curries,
learning love in the rhythm of spoons and spices,
in the silence between us
where no one else had ever stayed long enough to listen.

I watched you grow,
watched you shed your boyhood
like a second skin.

You came to me a boy.
You left me a man.
A father.

And you didn’t just leave memories.
You left me my greatest gifts—
my sons.

Maybe we didn’t last.
Maybe we weren’t meant to.
But for that—
I’ll always be grateful.

x