The Storm We Prayed For Poem by cassidy Lovato

Before you,
there was silence
where a heartbeat should have been.

A space
that never quite closed,
a grief that sat quietly
inside everything that came after.

And then
there was you.

Not by chance.
Not by accident.

By hope
that refused to give up.

By prayers whispered
through fear.
By hands held tighter
because we knew
what it felt like
to lose.

Every moment of you
felt fragile.

Every flutter,
every ache,
every dizzy spell
was a question
no one could answer.

Stay.
Please stay.

And you did.

You came into this world
fast,
loud in your own way,
like you had somewhere to be
and no time to waste.

And from the very beginning,
you tested us.

You were not the easy kind of love.

You were sleepless nights,
short naps,
car rides we couldn't take,
tears that turned into more
than we thought we could handle.

You pushed every part of us
to the edge.

And somehow
you were still everything
we had asked for.

Because you were here.
Because you stayed.

And time…
time did what it always does.

It softened the chaos
into something we could hold.

And you—

you turned into fire.

Movement.
Energy.
A force that fills every room
without asking permission.

You lead
before anyone tells you to.
You run
before anyone can stop you.

You want everything,
all at once,
and somehow
you try to do it all.

A spark
that never learned
how to dim itself.

You are your father
in so many ways.

In your eyes,
your smile,
the way you move through the world
like it is yours to figure out.

And every time I look at you,
I see him—

and somehow
I fall in love all over again.

But you are mine too.

In the way you come to me,
in the way you help,
the way you tease,
the way you still reach
for something only I can give.

My rainbow baby.

Not soft and quiet
like people expect after a storm—

but lightning.

Bright.
Unpredictable.
Alive.

And now,
time is moving again.

Faster than I want it to.

You are growing
into something more
right in front of me.

New seasons.
New beginnings.

A world opening up
that I won't always be
at the center of.

And I already know
you are going to run toward it.

Fearless.
Curious.
Completely yourself.

Just like you've always been.

And I will stand here,
watching you go,
heart full in a way
I can't explain

because you are not just
the child we hoped for.

You are the child
who stayed.