Best Poems Written by Isabelle Durbin

A letter to my future self

Dear future self,
         Right now I do not care what they think of me. 
It feels like standing in the middle of a room and not flinching. 
It feels like shedding a skin I was never meant to wear.
I hope you never put it back on.
I hope you never start performing again just to be digestible.

I already know the world can be cruel. I see it in the tiny betrayals, 
in the softness people pretend to have, in the way love can disappear without a warning.
I don't romanticize it. I don't expect it to be fair, but I want something better for us anyways.
I want a life that feels chosen. I want depth without despair. I want love that doesn't feel like survival. 
I want success that doesn't cost my soul.

As my friends and I drift into separate futures I hope I let them go with open hands. 
I hope I never confuse outgrowing with abandonment.
I hope I wish them well without wishing I had stayed smaller to keep them close.
I wonder if you still see the world the way I do now -- darker, deeper, layered with meanings 
people tend to walk past.
Do you still notice the silence between words?
Do you still sense when something is going to fall apart before it does?

I hope you've kept your depth. 
I just hope it no longer feels like loneliness. 
If the wold is still sharp, I hope you became sharper -- not in cruelty, but in clarity.
Stay deep, but don't drown.

Love yours truly,
Me

Copyright © Isabelle Durbin | Year Posted 2026