Mixed Ways

I walked in mixed ways for a long time,
between shadows and streetlights,
between borrowed couches and quiet goodbyes,
between the weight of staying
and the whisper of leaving.

There was no front door with my name on it,
no key turning in a lock that said
you belong here.

Just bags that stayed half-packed,
a coat that knew too many hallways,
and nights where sleep sat beside me
but never truly came.

Hidden homeless, they call it�"
but the hiding is the hardest part.

You smile in daylight,
say I’m grand when people ask,
but inside there are storms
no forecast ever warned about.

Some nights the thoughts came heavy,
like dark rain against a thin window.
They told me the road was ending,
that maybe the quiet
would finally be kind.

And I stood there
between two roads.

One paved with surrender,
soft and silent and final.

The other
barely a path at all�"
just a thin line of light
far down the tunnel.

I didn’t know where it led.
I only knew
it was light.

So I kept walking.

Past the doubt.
Past the nights that felt endless.
Past the echo of voices
that said I was lost.

Because somewhere along the way
a door began to appear in my mind�"
not built from bricks
but from hope.

A door that said
stay.

A door that said
there is more road ahead.

And maybe one day
there will be a key in my hand,
a place where the light
waits just inside the hall.

But until that day,
I walk these mixed ways
with the quiet courage
of someone who chose
the tunnel�"

not for its darkness,
but for the light
waiting at the end.