Becomes Stories

Insight of my life

A collection of poems on love, loss, becoming, and the people who stay.

Growing up doesn't mean questions disappear, they just change. Beyond is a continuation of becoming, written from the other side of growing up. Where Within explored finding a voice, Beyond lives in the quiet after it. These poems reflect the trials and tribulations of adulthood: grief and loss, disillusionment and hope, learning how the world truly works, and choosing to keep dreaming anyway. This collection is shaped by lived experience: navigating an unfair society, facing death and change, redefining love and belonging, and holding onto softness in a world that often demands hardness. The questions are no longer about who you might become, but how to live as who you already are. Beyond is an ongoing invitation for readers who are still becoming, but with clearer eyes, removing the rose colored glasses, steadier feet, and a deeper understanding of themselves. For anyone learning how to exist in the real world without losing their sense of wonder, this space is for you. If Within helped you feel seen, Beyond is here to sit with you as you grow.

THE NAMES WE OUTGREW by winter-fire Some loves do not end. They simply stop being places you can live. On the eve of his wedding, Nikolai is confronted with a truth he believed had been buried for years. Letters once lost to silence resurface, revealing that the woman he mourned never stopped loving him-and that the life he painstakingly rebuilt may have been founded on a misunderstanding that was never his to make. Caught between two women who embody different forms of survival-one forged in fire and ambition, the other in patience and quiet devotion-Nikolai must face a question with no merciful answer: Is love defined by the passion that first breaks us, or by the steady presence that teaches us how to endure? Told through shifting perspectives and steeped in imagery of winter, memory, and restraint, The Names We Outgrew is a literary exploration of grief, gratitude, and the cost of becoming whole-asking what it means to choose a future when the past refuses to remain silent.

Short poems exploring the pain of losing someone without truly losing them, but losing yourself instead. A quiet grief for the past version that will never return, and the fragile hope of becoming something new, until sorrow slowly turns into joy. 📌 Pinterest board: https://pin.it/397dQqEff

He hadn't expected to see her that morning. The trading floor was its usual blur of screens and murmured conversations, and he was half‑listening to his colleague when something shifted in the corner of his vision. A familiar silhouette. A movement he recognised before he even consciously registered her face. She's here today. He straightened without thinking, a reflex he immediately regretted. He hoped it didn't look obvious. He tried to keep listening to whatever his colleague was saying, but his attention had already drifted. She walked past with her head down, quiet, composed, almost too composed. He wondered if she'd seen him. He wondered if she was avoiding his eyes on purpose or if she was just shy. He'd never been able to tell. He told himself not to look again. He looked again. A few minutes later, he saw her stand up from her desk. He wasn't even facing her directly, but he felt the shift in the room. He turned slightly, casually, he hoped, and there she was, cup in hand, walking toward the kitchen. She glanced up. For a second, their eyes almost met. Then she looked down again, quick, like the moment startled her. She's shy, he thought. Or maybe I'm imagining all of this. He tried to return to his work, but the moment replayed itself in his mind more than once. He didn't know why he reacted like this around her. He was usually composed. Controlled. But something about her quietness made him aware of himself in a way he couldn't quite explain. Later, when he noticed she wasn't in the next day, he wondered, briefly, quietly - if she was alright. He told himself it was nothing. Just a colleague being absent. But the truth was simpler. He had noticed her. And he wasn't entirely sure why she made him feel the way she did.

What happens when a foster teen gets adopted? Will she end up liking her new family? Maybe even more than her real. Will she ever be accepted for who she is and what she wants to do? Or will this new family be her worst nightmare?

Introspective haikus regarding love, healing, and regaining balance. Let me know how they make you feel. Thank you for reading. 😊 ~~~ Highest Rankings: #6 in freewrite #22 in newauthor #33 in haiku #39 in growth #60 in healing (out of 8k)

I recently wrote a chapter of Thoughts I Never Intended to Share titled "My Collection of Words." Like many of the chapters that preceded this one, its subject was grounded in truth. I actually do carry a small black book in my pocket that contains all my favorite quotes, some of them my own, most of them from my favorite writers. These quotes mean a lot to me. They have changed my life. So, I decided that I would like to share them here. This will not really be my own writing, more of a way that I can share meaning with the world. Please enjoy my Collection of Words. The cover I chose is a painting by the legendary Felix Mendelssohn, a veritable renaissance man and composer of great nuance and substance. A perfect match for the words that lie within.

What do you speak when the sky sits heavy on your tongue? This debut collection drifts between breath and storm, threading poetry through clouds of grief, resilience, surrender, and sacred defiance. With rhythm that pulses like prayer and imagery that clings like mist, A Mouthful of Clouds invites you to taste the weight of words unsaid and the softness of survival. These poems do not ask for silence-they rise, float, break, and rain.

Soule loves the goats in his herd, especially Mama Maa, his mother. But as he grows he realizes something is terribly wrong. He doesn't think like the other goats do. He doesn't act like the other goats do. And he is becoming quite sick with questions. Then, something unthinkable happens. A monster attacks Soule's herd! Amid the blood and terror, a figure emerges: Lore, the king of the Tigers. Lore is interested in Soule, and not as a meal. Lore knows what Soule is. But will Soule accept the truth and face his frightening destiny? ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ Have you ever felt totally different than everyone else? Do you feel like no one really "gets" you? Do people often call you strange or weird? Are you afraid that someday someone will discover the "real" you? On the vein of "Who Moved My Cheese?" and "Jonathan Livingstong Seagull," GOAT is a self-help book hidden within an ancient Hindu fable sometimes referred to "The Grass Eating Tiger" or "The Lion and the Sheep." I encountered this fable while conducting intense research on a variety of topics relevant to psychology and the practical usefulness of Hindu and Buddhist beliefs. I wanted to find answers to some of life's most bothersome questions surrounding loneliness, isolation, ambition and mindfulness. In each chapter, Lore gives Soule a lesson that profoundly impacts Lore's future and beliefs about himself. I hope they are also able to help you too! I know they helped me!

I, Miles Mercer, always thought adulthood would feel lighter than this. I pictured myself young and free, living loudly before life asked me to settle, before responsibility showed up early and uninvited. College was never an option-I couldn't afford it-so I worked instead, one job bleeding into another, paying bills that never seemed to shrink. My parents checked out long before I did; everyone was left to fend for themselves, and with older brothers already fighting their own battles, I learned early how to stand alone. At night, I worked at a bar, and sometimes-when my boss was in a good mood-he'd let me play. Just me, a guitar, and a room that slowly learned my name. The crowds grew. The tips got better. People started coming just to hear me. That's when I knew I couldn't keep doing this halfway. I needed to chase it fully. And somewhere between wanting more and needing escape, I met Violet-the college girl who walked into my life in winter right before everything stopped.

Find out how to learn what your spirit animals are and learn to communicate with them. Become one with the environment of your spirit animal. And become a creature of nature without the killer instinct, just the survivial side. And learn to heal your brokenness.

Seven teens. Seven puppies. A destiny they never asked for-but must embrace to become the heroes they never thought they'd be. When seven teens-each carrying silent battles and broken pieces-are pulled together by seven glowing puppies, they're bound to a destiny they never asked for. In the sleepy town of Oakridge, where nothing ever changes, the sky fractures open during a freak meteor shower-sending pulses of strange energy through the Earth and awakening something ancient. Each teen, haunted by unspoken wounds, finds themselves bonded to an abandoned puppy glowing with mysterious power. These dogs aren't just companions-they're keys: to secrets, to powers, and to a destiny none of them chose. As the teens and their pups begin to unlock abilities that echo their deepest truths, a terrifying force rises in the shadows-one that will stop at nothing to destroy their bond and erase them entirely. To survive, they must stop pretending. To rise, they must stand together. Even if they don't know how. This is a story for the quiet ones. The feelers. The outsiders. The storm survivors. Those searching for a place where their silence is understood-and their pain isn't too much. Maybe this isn't just a story. Maybe it's a mirror. And maybe, just maybe... it's yours, too.

How does one live? Must we have fun, joyous times, or work every second to get that one meal or maybe go to church? I'm not sure. I can tell you, however, that living has to involve all of them. But living doesn't just involve those things, it involves becoming you. Before becoming you though, you must first decide you're not who you are. That's the tricky part. That feeling of self realization that all you are is an act. That you want to become you. The thing is, you always have been you; you just have to find it somewhere under the makeup, clothes, cologne, all of it. I found myself because of her. This is our story.