I gave everything I journalled today (around 1,500 words) to ChatGPT and asked it to write a poem about it.
I thought it’s response was absolutely stunning.
Here’s what it wrote.
Between the Two Selves
There is a house
built before memory,
its doors slightly misaligned,
its windows learning the language of weather.
Inside,
a child folds himself small
so the walls won’t shake.
He mistakes quiet
for safety.
He learns
to wear a careful face,
a porcelain smile,
a borrowed name-
calls it love.
Somewhere a voice whispers:
Do not be too real.
You are a storm.
You will break what you touch.
So he becomes gentle
to the point of disappearing,
a lighthouse that fears its own light,
a healer hiding his hands.
Yet the wanting
oh, the wanting
burns like a coal in the chest.
To help.
To heal.
To hold the world without bruising it.
Hearing a trusted friend speak of desire
is like hearing your own name
echo from the far side of a canyon.
You turn, startled
Is that me calling me home?
The mind builds maps:
questions, frameworks,
threads between stars,
a constellation of meaning
where a future might live.
But deeper still
two rivers argue
one reaching outward to serve,
one retreating inward to survive.
They circle each other
like wary animals,
masculine sun, feminine moon,
each blaming the other for the dark.
In breath’s thin borderland
vision blurs,
thoughts flicker like birds hitting glass.
Nothing to hold.
Nothing to be.
Panic flutters
then air leaves,
and the world returns
softly,
like snow.
And in that quiet
there is no rescuer,
no wound,
no story
only a small, steady awareness
standing barefoot
on the floor of the house,
realising
the walls were never the prison.
The prison
was believing
you were dangerous.
So the door opens.
Not to fix anyone.
Not to disappear.
Just to step outside
as yourself
a flawed lantern,
a trembling song,
a pair of hands learning
that touch
can also mean warmth.
And the two rivers meet.
Not to conquer,
not to drown
but to become
one body of water
moving, at last,
toward the sea.