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There is a kind of longing that has no destination.

You miss something—someone—a place—a time—

that you know you’ll never meet again.

Not in the same form. Not in the same light.

For me, it’s my country.

But not the country in the news or the maps.

It’s a memory of jasmine in the evening air,

the echo of familiar voices,

the rhythm of a language spoken without needing to translate your heart.

That place, that time, that self…

is gone. And yet, it is with me, always.

Art has been my sanctuary.

In creating, I find moments of forgetting—

or perhaps moments of merging—

where the ache dissolves into colour,

into thread, silk, felt, form.

The work becomes a prayer,

a map,

a way to keep that lost world breathing.

But here is the truth I don’t always admit:

once the work is finished,

the longing returns.

A quiet emptiness sits beside me.

The beauty I created has flown out of me,

and I feel hollow.

Too tired to begin again.

Too full of absence to be filled with new shapes.

I used to think I was trying to distract myself from the ache.

Now I realise:

the ache is part of the work.

It fuels it, colours it, gives it truth.

Maybe I don’t need to cure this longing.

Maybe I need to live with it—

honour it.

Let it soften me,

guide me,

teach me how to hold what I cannot change.

So when I cannot create,

I rest.

I sit with my longing like an old friend.

And when I can create again,

I stitch a bit more sky back into my soul.