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Jan 2019 · 256
YOU
Brandon Peatman Jan 2019
YOU
Have I ever spoken about You?
I’m not quite sure where You came from,
but You’ve been with me for a year now.
I think I was happy before,
before You introduced Yourself into my life.
You forced me to see the world differently,
became the causation of my distance from humanity.
I don’t want You.

At first I thought it would be ok,
that I was strong, that we could live together,
but I did not invite You.
You are an unwelcomed guest into my life.
And every time I think I’m putting up a good fight, You comes back stronger,
beat me close to death,
leave me begging for salvation.
I don’t want to live with You anymore.

I would say I feel numb, but that would involve feelings,
A concept that is all but a fantasy to me now.
Why did You do this to me?
You have been a parasite to my emotion.
A leech that has consumed my perception of happiness.
I guess it’s my fault really.
I let You into my life,
I was not strong enough to ask You to leave.

Are You pleased with Yourself?
You have taken everything,
extracted every last ounce of my being.
I am nothing.
You have made me nothing.
The bullet is my life and I am the empty casing,
discarded and left behind by society.
And You are the one that pulled the trigger.

I’m struggling to sleep again.
There was a brief period I thought I was free.
That I had won, escaped from the dungeon You had imprisoned me in.
But You are an infection,
and this infection has come back stronger.
I can’t fight this anymore,
I can’t fight You.
I lose.
Draft of a poem I've been working on. Let me know if you have any critiques or ideas
Jan 2019 · 249
The Nice Guy
Brandon Peatman Jan 2019
Why is it that The Nice Guy always finishes last?
He tries so hard to please you.
To give you everything He can.
And it’s not enough

The Nice Guy is protective.
He does not try to control you like your past boyfriends. Instead He encourages you to learn and to explore, but He is also there for you.
He is the binding of a book, wrapping all the contents of you inside and guarding you from our patriarchal society.
You are at the epicentre of His mind. You are the sun that gives light to the world. His world.
If you let Him, He would give you everything. Mind, body and soul.
But you don’t let Him.

The Nice Guy is caring.
He asks you about your day; and what do you tell Him?
You give him the same answer over and over again. “It was ok.”
You don’t tell him that your boss tried to touch you for the third time this month or that when you said no he called you a *****.
You don’t tell Him that you feel helpless and worthless because of it.
Expendable, like trash. A common ******* passed around by a world of arrogant ‘men’.
And you know He knows. With every passing day and every “ok” you push Him further and further away.
But He is empathetic and He is intuitive. He knows that you are lying. He sees the wince as he asks you the question.
You wonder why He continues to ask.

The Nice Guy is hopeful.
He continues to show his interest in the hopes that one day you will give Him a true answer. A true insight into your life.
To peel away at the hard shell you have cocooned yourself in.
And He waits.
When you come home from the club at 4am unable to walk, He doesn’t shout, He takes care of you. He takes you to bed, gives you a glass of water and stays up all night to watch over you.
It’s your brother’s birthday tomorrow; he will be 6.
Your friends knew that when they pressured you into that 8th shot. Is that what a good friend does? You know it’s not and you know they’re not right for you.
But from your search for acceptance, you allow this manipulation to continue.
You are complex and He knows that, He understands. That’s why He doesn’t ask who the man you were kissing on your Snapchat story was. You forgot when you were blackout drunk.
He didn’t.

The Nice Guy is struggling.
He loves you more than anything in the world. He would die for you. He would **** for you.
And yet with one mistake, one small deviation from morality it’s over.
Finished, tainted with the memory of his actions like wine on carpet. You scrub at the stains praying they vanish. And they may get better over time, but they will never truly be gone.
But you, you pushed him.
You are a snake that has poisoned and cursed the only ounce of goodness that was shining over your life.
Ripped at His heart like a crow, eating away until there was nothing left but a corpse.
You have extracted all the essence of goodness away from Him and left Him broken, a fragment of the man He used to be.

It’s selfish really. You take all of that guilt from those late nights at the club, from the guys you flirt with when drunk and deflected this all back to Him.
Was it really that bad what he did? Or is this just convenient for you?
It’s an escape rope. An escape rope which you have grasped firmly with both hands.
Our minds are the ocean and you are the anchor, dragging Him down to the bottom with you.
Yes He has fallen from perfection, but you deserve his imperfection.

But The Nice Guy is no longer The Nice Guy.
And you no longer want Him.
This is my first poem. I hope you enjoy and constructive criticism is welcome

— The End —