Quiet Echoes Of Midnight Poem by Lewis Dever

Once, she was shadows and silver,
a wisp of night cloaked in black,
pierced by moonlight and metal gleams—
a constellation of studs, rings, and chains
that sang a symphony of rebellion,
an orchestra for the outcast soul.
She walked through life like a dark star,
burning fiercely against the ordinary,
her presence a quiet defiance,
her eyes lined with the night's deepest ink.

She was the one who drank moonlight
as if it were elixir, who read poetry
like sacred scripture scrawled on skin,
who knew every crevice of pain
but wore it like a badge,
a goth queen of the undercurrents,
a monarch of the misunderstood.

Now, years have polished her edges,
the silver has softened,
the dark has turned to dusk.
She's shed the armor of youth,
traded combat boots for quiet shoes,
her piercings faded into echoes,
her hair no longer a canvas
of wild declarations but a calm
waterfall of gentle hues.
But still, in the quiet rooms
where she finds her solace,
the embers of that past life flicker,
not gone, just resting, just still.

The world feels sharper now,
each sound a knife that slices the air,
each touch a thunderstorm against her skin.
She moves gently through these later years,
more reserved, as if each step
were a whisper, each word
a carefully folded note passed
to the universe. Autism wraps her
in its soft cocoon of solitude,
a refuge from the cacophony,
a sanctuary from the too much,
the too bright, the too loud.

But oh, how her heart still beats
in quiet rhythms of kindness,
how she still carries within her
the essence of stardust rebellion.
She may have turned down the volume,
but her spirit hums a familiar tune,
one of empathy, of understanding,
a melody only those who've lived
on the fringes truly know.

In crowded rooms, she seeks corners,
shadows that feel like old friends,
spaces where she can be
without the pressure to perform,
to pretend to be anything
other than her own quiet self.
She listens more than she speaks,
but her silence is not absence;
it's a language all its own,
a gentle music to those
who've learned to hear it.

She is a mosaic of her many selves,
each piece a chapter,
each chapter a lesson in survival,
a story of resilience and grace.
She doesn't wear her past
on her sleeve anymore,
but it's there in the way
she understands the lost,
the way she reaches out to the broken,
offering a soft hand, a knowing smile.

Still a queen, though her crown
is invisible now, a weightless thing
carved from years and tears,
from the quiet triumphs of living
one day at a time.
She has learned to be gentle
with herself, to savour the stillness
that once eluded her.
And though she no longer
dances to the same dark hymns,
the rhythm of her past
still pulses softly in her veins,
a reminder that she is,
and always will be,
a great person made
of midnight and morning,
of the bold and the quiet,
of every shade in between.
Leah our silent queen