River and Its Banks

We laugh in quiet rooms the world can’t find;
Your voice knows where I leave my sharper mind.
You feel like home—not promised, yet exact,
A place that asks for nothing I can’t act.

To be understood outlives the grand display;
You see the cost of always being “okay.”
I never said how heavy I had grown—
You let me lay it down without being known.

So stay with me when everything gives way,
When even strength has nothing left to say.
If all I choose is quiet, calm, and true,
Then let that stand—I place my life with you.

 
—

Written: April 2025
By Casey Huang
From the Still Poetry House archive