VALENTINE’S FIRE

Born in the midnight of February’s bloom,

Valentine sky, but I grew up in a room

Where my mother wore storms like a second skin,

And my father was work—always leaving again.

Youngest of three, bones, quiet eyes,

Counting my coins like a shield in disguise.

They laughed, called me Scrooge, I smiled through the sting,

`Cause I knew pennies can feel like a wing.

One loyal friend when the hallways turned mean,

Two “different” kids in a hard machine.

We stood back to back when the world threw stones,

Learning early how to carry our own.

I was shy, but I felt every crack in the air,

Taught to honor and protect—show love, be fair.

So I gave like a river, no questions, no gate,

And I learned too late what it costs to be great.

Then he found a new world, and I vanished from view,

I called out for comfort—no one knew what to do.

Mother was drowning, father still gone,

So I held my heart up and taught it: Be strong.

I love like fire, I hate what it burns,

I bleed in silence while the whole world turns.

I’m a heart with a halo and a war in my chest,

Still choosing the good when I’m given the test.

If you want my devotion, don’t come half true—

I rebuilt from the wreckage, and I’ll rebuild you too.

Let it shake the walls, let it split every scar:

I’m not what broke me—I'm what I am.

Teen love came toxic, sweet lips, sharp blame,

They chipped at my worth till I questioned my name.

I changed my body, but the mirror stayed cold,

So I wore a mask and I did what I’m told.

I learned heat in the kitchen, pressure, speed,

But my hands kept dreaming brickwork and need.

So I worked for free, turned dust into proof,

Till 2017 put a roof on my youth.

Then she looked at me like I could breathe,

Love turned my mask into something I’d leave.

But bills grew teeth, and I fought them at night,

Calling creditors, bargaining pieces of light.

Spring 2019—my mother fell down,

Silence in the story, sirens in town.

We opened our home, signed years in ink,

A farmhouse of hope on the edge of a brink.

She went back to the man that hurt her the most,

And our love turned thin like a dying ghost.

By 2022, we broke—no sound,

Two empty hands, two lives on the ground.

One winter night on a mountain of white,

I stared at the stars and I questioned the fight.

Morning found breath in my frozen skin,

So I walked back home and I let my dad in.

He said: “Pain doesn’t choose you. You choose who you’ll be.

Stand up. Build a man that your future can see.”

So I trained, I worked, I carved out my spine,

Turned grief into fuel, turned dark into shine.

I love like fire, I hate what it burns,

But I turn every loss into lessons I earn.

I’m the boy in the storm, I’m the man in the flame,

Still soft, still strong, still proud of my name.

Let them cry in silence, let them shake, let them know—

From Valentine’s midnight to the edge of the snow:

I’m alive. I’m becoming. And now you know.