The Echo of What I Never Said
Anger burns in my chest like a coal that never dies. Sometimes I think I could live there forever, in that silent fire that consumes everything, in that heat that devours from the inside out. Other times, I think of doing what I’ve always done: wallow in it, hide it, and let it rot within me until it becomes part of my breath.
But I don’t want to stay quiet anymore. I want to scream so loudly that even the planets stop to listen. I want to tear it out of me like a thorn that no longer belongs, to free myself from this weight that drags me back into the same dreams, over and over again.
I have lived alongside nightmares, with echoes that push me toward pain as if I were searching for more of it. I’ve punished myself for what was never my fault, and I’ve hurt those I love because I didn’t know how to stop hurting myself. I used my body as a battlefield to punish my soul, believing that somehow, I could pay for something I should never have carried.
In dreams, I see faces that judge me, shadows that mock, and the silence I built to survive. I see myself small, fragile, as weak as I once felt. And when I wake, all that remains is the anger—stubborn, red, alive inside me, refusing to let go.
I’ve tried to release it. I’ve searched for light, for forgiveness, for peace. And still, that moment lives inside me, as if it were tattooed into my bones. It wasn’t only my body that was invaded—it was my soul that was torn open. I relive it in flashes: a smell, a sound, a sudden shadow that doesn’t belong. My body remembers what my mind tries to forget, and the fury returns, relentless, pulling me back to that exact moment when everything stopped.
Years have passed—decades, maybe—but sometimes it feels as though I’m still walking through that same door, still breathing the same air heavy with fear, still hearing the same television stories no one wants to remember. Maybe that place no longer exists. Maybe those who hurt me are gone. Perhaps all that remains is this anger—the last flame of a day that refuses to die.
And yet, when I close my eyes, something inside me insists on turning back. It pushes me to look straight into the fire, to face what I’ve spent a lifetime trying to escape. Maybe that’s why my soul keeps bringing me here. Maybe this fire—this silence that burns—is not punishment but a calling.
It feels as if my soul, wiser than pain itself, knows that the time has come to let it all go, to face it without trembling, and to turn the ashes into voice. Because even silence, when it burns, can become light.
Nel Duarte.
Calgary, Nov 09 2025 6:18 am
👉 Also read “The Mirror and the Wound,” a reflection on how to accept your own reflection without ceasing to tremble.