Writers 
I have a dream
that has never owned a pair of shoes.
It has walked barefoot
through rooms where the lights
were turned off too early,
through mornings when breakfast
was only a glass of water,
through nights when tomorrow
felt like a question
nobody could answer.
My dream has never complained.
It simply keeps walking.
Sometimes,
I wonder how something so small
can survive inside a person
who has seen so many reasons
to give up.
But dreams are strange like that.
They don’t always need money
to stay alive.
Sometimes they survive
on one stubborn thought:
“Maybe things will be different.”
Maybe one day
I will wake up
and the things my family worries about
will no longer be the things
that keep us awake.
Maybe my mother
will laugh without calculating
what the laughter costs.
Maybe my father
will rest without carrying
the weight of tomorrow
on his shoulders.
Maybe the younger ones
will ask for something simple
and I won’t have to watch
someone search their pockets
before answering.
I don’t dream of being famous.
I dream of being able
to breathe without fear.
I dream of opening the fridge
and finding enough.
I dream of paying for something
without first wondering
what I will have to sacrifice.
I dream of becoming
the person who can say,
“Don’t worry.
I’ve got it.”
Not because I want power,
but because I know
what it feels like
when nobody can say those words to you.
So yes,
my dream is still barefoot.
It still walks slowly.
It still gets tired.
There are days
when I look at the distance
and wonder whether I will ever reach it.
But I refuse to leave it behind.
Because every great life
must have started somewhere.
And perhaps mine begins here—
with empty pockets,
a tired heart,
a little courage,
and a dream
that refuses to die quietly.
One day,
I want to look back
at these difficult years
and realize they were not
the ending of my story.
They were only
the first page.
And when that day comes,
I hope I remember
the version of me
who kept walking barefoot,
because she deserves
to know where
the road finally took her.
