I thought you were my salvation in the bleakness of the world
Telling me I am enough when it was convenient for you
That I wasn’t worth it when it was not
I thought the tide rose and fell with your breath
That the sun came up with you
Little did I know  
I was always my own salvation

I lost myself with him
I lost who I had been and who I could be
As he achieved his dreams
I stood at his side
making myself small
Insignificant to his greatness
I succumbed to the drunken 2AM calls after he broke my heart
The pictures he asked for
The videos I sent
I was within his grasp
Nothing more than a girl who would never amount to anything
Under his watchful gaze

He always made me wear my hair down
Long golden locks cascading down my back
Swaying in the wind whenever I took a step
Until one day I was free
I wore that hair like a cloak
Perfectly framing my face
Hiding myself away from the rest of the world within
He searched and searched for years but could never find me
His commands eventually becoming my salvation

Loving him was like dipping your toes into the Pacific Ocean
Your skin began to tingle
Bones aching in protest
But after a while
The tingling stopped
The aches subsided
Until you were left completely numb

It sneaks up in the middle of the night
Too cowardly to be shown in broad daylight
With it's fanged teeth and snarling voice
It is the thing that leaves you with no choice
It bends and it breaks and it steals and it snatches
And if you're lucky it'll leave you with only a few scratches
But this six letter word is not monster nor demon
So how could it be that it breaks even the strongest freemen?
That is the question that has no answer
And we are continually left with this idea of Cancer

Most of the time I hated him for leaving
How he walked out and never looked back to see my tear stained face
My body crumpling to the earth at the end of the driveway
But there are other times when I remember
AC/DC pouring out of the speakers when his truck pulled up to the house
The smell of smoke clinging to his white t-shirts and plaid jackets
The ***** with a splash of cranberry juice
I remember the cracks of his knees as he came up the stairs in the evening
Or the way he carried me into their room
Laying me down beside my half-asleep mother
But mostly
I remember that this world tore him apart
Ripping his soul into tiny pieces with every passing day
Until he was so far gone that not even the whispers of his little girl could bring him back

Far off in the distance the flames licked the trees with a sensuality
known only to the forest
She obliged for a time
but the sparks grew greedy for more than she could offer
Bridges went up in flames
Waterfalls altered forever
While in the City
We all came together to watch as smoke billowed about
and the first snow fell on a hot September night