Before the Roar

It started with the weight—
the slow, smothering fog
after the votes were cast.
A silence so loud
it made doubt feel like gravity.

I scrolled in the dark,
phone burning in my palm,
my breath shallow with knowing.
Some of us screamed inside.
Some froze.
And we watched
as the house we thought was ours
began rearranging itself
without permission.

We whispered:
Is this how it ends?

We braced.
The air felt thinner.
Even time seemed to hold back.
Something quiet in me said: go.

But endings rarely come all at once.
They arrive in slivers,
in the small absences
we agree to tolerate.

And then—
Saturday came.

Feet on pavement.
Signs in hand.
Not a roar,
but a pulse.
The sound of waking up.

Not a wave,
but a shift in the current.
Not a flood,
but the pressure behind the dam.
Just enough to feel
that the stillness
was no longer still.

They say
you don’t need everyone—
just enough
to lean toward the breaking point
at the same time.

This isn’t spectacle.
It’s precision.
Not a scream,
but the collective inhale
before the shatter.

This—
this is what comes
before the roar.

Three million hearts
beating in rhythm,
writing resolve
on cardboard and sidewalks,
in the footnotes of headlines
still trained to look away.

This moment
isn’t heroic.
It’s cumulative.
It builds in whispers,
marches in margins,
gathers in the space
between surrender and decision.

Even gravity
can be tilted
if you lean long enough.
Even silence
can be broken
by breath alone.

To act
when apathy is easier—
that is its own defiance.
To keep showing up—
that is the work.

This is not prophecy.
It’s pressure.

Not inevitability—
but ignition.

The plan is in motion.
So is the resistance.

We don’t need to be everything.
We need to be enough.

So the question lingers,
soft and precise:

Will you move with us, before the roar?
Or will you wait
to see which silence
rewrites the story
you were meant to break?

🌀 This piece is part of a connected trio on hope, presence, and quiet resistance. You can read the full arc here:

This Is What Hope Looks Like / Not in Rage, But in Resonance / Before the Roar