The Child Inside Me by RAHEES UBN RAFEEQ

They say I have grown.
That my voice is deeper now,
my footsteps heavier,
my eyes more tired
than the stars above midnight cities.

But inside me
far beyond this aging skin
a child still lives.

He still runs through imaginary kingdoms
with scraped knees and fearless dreams.
He still believes
that clouds are ships
and the moon follows him home.

Sometimes,
in the middle of crowded conversations,
I hear him whisper.

Softly.

“Do you still remember
who we wanted to become?”

And suddenly,
the world becomes painfully quiet.

Because somewhere between survival and reality,
I abandoned pieces of him
on railway stations of disappointment,
inside classrooms that measured intelligence
but never kindness,
inside mirrors
that taught me how to hide tears professionally.

The child inside me
still cries over broken birds.
Still smiles at rain.
Still searches for magic
in ordinary places.

But adulthood
oh, adulthood is cruel.

It teaches us
how to shake hands without trust,
how to laugh without joy,
how to say “I’m fine”
while drowning silently beneath expectations.

So the child inside me
learned to stay quiet.

He watches from forgotten corners of my soul
while I chase deadlines,
count failures,
and wear confidence
like borrowed clothing.

Yet some nights,
he returns.

In the scent of old books.
In the laughter of children outside my window.
In faded photographs
where my smile was once honest.

And when the world sleeps,
he asks me questions
that no adult can answer.

“Why do humans grow taller
but smaller inside?”

I have no answer.

Because perhaps growing up
is merely the slow art
of betraying our own innocence.

Still
I protect him.

The child inside me
who still believes apologies matter,
who waves at strangers,
who dreams impossible dreams
without fearing the word impossible.

The world may call him naïve.
But I call him sacred.

For he is the final proof
that life has not completely hardened me.

And maybe one day,
when my hair turns silver
and time begins closing its ancient doors,
I will meet him again

not as a forgotten memory,
but as an old friend
waiting patiently inside my heart.

And together
we will run barefoot
through the gardens of yesterday,
where no dream was ever too large
for small hands to hold.