WHAT THE NIGHT MADE OF ME
- 21 hours ago
- 1 min read
By Richelle Marie Simms
I was not shaped by light.
Light only reveals.
It does not forge.
The night is the one
who made me.
She took me into her ribs,
into her ink-black hush,
and taught me the language
of becoming.
Not with flames—
with embers.
Not with shouts—
with breath.
Not with violence—
with precision.
In her womb of dusk,
I learned what power feels like
when it isn’t performing.
When it isn’t begging to be seen.
When it simply exists
because it must.
People think the dark hides things.
They’re wrong.
The dark shows you
what you were too afraid to touch.
And when I finally touched it—
the truth,
the shard,
the quiet thunder of who I am—
I didn’t break.
I became.
The night did not take anything from me.
She returned everything
I had abandoned.
And now when I speak,
the shadows listen.
Not because they must—
but because they recognize
their own.