An account of the growing.

I did not set out to write a collection. I set out to survive one.

These poems arrived the way seasons do — not by my scheduling, but by some deeper necessity. Some came in the dark of late hours, when the questions in me grew louder than sleep. Some arrived mid-prayer, mid-storm, mid-longing. A few were written before I knew what I was saying; only later did I understand what the words were reaching toward.

What I know is this: I am a tree. Not yet fully grown. Not always sure of my fruit, or my soil, or the climate I was made for. But I am rooted in something I cannot name entirely — only trust, and return to, and beg not to be severed from.