I let go. Everything that lived in my hands is gone, leaving only hope, and love, and small fragile dreams.

Silence settles. Even the words have gone still. The thoughts have stopped whispering. No expectations. No counting of days. No ache over what might have been.

I accept things as they are. What never happened, and what came to pass despite my prayers. I accept the pain of loss. The deaths I could not prevent. Everything my body has endured.

I accept my surrender, my weakness, my inability to defend myself. I accept my naivety, my loyalty, my honesty — and the cost of them, which the people who praise them have never had to pay.

I accept the blindness that cannot be undone. I was born this way.

The words come out slowly, like stones from an old wound. They come out clean.

I accept it all. As it is.

I surrender to helplessness. I surrender to myself. I surrender the fight. I surrender to fate.