My wife and I have been together for four years and she's never once done her own laundry. We're probably in a period where she feels "judged and attacked" because I have the audacity to ask that she participate in putting away her clothes once I've washed, sorted, and folded everything. I even make the recommendation that we accomplish the task together, the deal being that once I've washed and folded everything we just put it away together. It might be a ten minute or less job. I'd say 97% of the time I'm working with patience and understanding to see that we manage the undesirable yet necessary work in life together. The other 3% is a state of cognitive dissonance wondering what I did to deserve this kind of dismissal. This is all because of course, after multiple instances of this and many other household chore responsibilities becoming neglected and taken on exclusively by me she has chosen to prioritize her friends, her phone, and most likely some love affair over the life she shares with me. I sit in silence during the day and a different kind of silence when she gets back in the evening to settle in to the couch watching Tik Tok videos and texting whoever, only to be interrupted by her consistent departures from our home. I probably spend all of 3 hours a day with her on a good day (not including sleep) and I feel extremely neglected in all aspects to the point of feeling like I'm being used exclusively for comfort purposes. I encourage communication and conversations even if they're hard. I'd much rather know that she's falling out of love with me than to catch her in the act of cheating, especially because we explicitly don't yell at each other or say hurtful things to one another even if we have a disagreement. Most of the time hitting a wall results in us both stopping all conversation until we come back to it with clearer heads. In the beginning of the relationship when I was too open minded, because that is a thing, I had even discussed the idea of a one-sided open marriage if she felt like she wanted to take care of any ****** urges she had. But she maintained that it's a monogamous relationship that she wants and I was happier for that. I am both responsible for managing the hygiene of the household and paying and handling all the bills. But for me to speak on this leads to the same end result of her feelings about never doing or being enough. And I've described this to her and myself to the point of my own fatigue as "giving herself away" to everyone else and leaving nothing to bring back here. But that's my problem, right? I could definitely choose to think about that differently. Ultimately, it leads to me not voicing my own feelings. And I find that because of this during my especially heightened sensitive periods I prefer to be alone. I simply do the work, feel the satisfaction of having it done, and move on. It's extremely exhausting choosing kindness and understanding and benefit of the doubt all the time. Must be nice to have an excuse to have somebody else take care of the things you simply don't want to! And I've always been a feminist. But go ahead, internet. Tell me about how this is all my fault because I'm a heterosexual white male

Do you know how those same doting eyes
That used to fantasize and dream
Look upon you now with the burden
Of solemn dismay, and disbelief

A ravenous doubt that plows through
All the pretenses and mended fences
You were laid upon
At the height of your caterwaul

And you saw it all crumbling
Falling just the same
All the same visage
And grandeur of your fame
Your intertwined tails casting spells
Dispelling all the questions and whys
Those poignant, meaningless alibis

...Allegories with story-book covers
That we craft and confide

As if they could ever be dependable
Once the Earth begins to shake
If they could once compensate
For that broken faith
I'd have to say
That would be where I see God
Within the Incarnate

And maybe its only a quiet
Dismissive nod
Maybe it's merely
A promiscuous thought
Maybe it's just the path
We together fought
and sought
or bought
now wrought
Is an intentionally intentional façade
For a much more sinister cancer

There.
That's the answer.
Our armor is deep-rooted
The fence where we'd come to call
And cry out together
Has been abandoned and polluted

The vole never saw his own shadow
Once it became diluted
He didn't instinctively leave ground
Nor distinctly know all along
He was supposed to get out
Never understood he was trapped
By the soil surrounding him
That he desperately called home

His vacant throne
Alike his bleached and bare bones
Worn down
Crown cast aside
Cruelly mocking the echoing cries
Of powerful voices
and Names that long ago rang out
And they, too, reverberate on
While we so carefully make not a sound

I am the gale of a storm
Pressed against your face
Rushing with hasty percussion
Then gone without a trace
A hailing siren's final resting place
What was seemingly a blessing
Now deceived and defaced
So easily forgotten
Already replaced

Hardly believed in
As if by mistake
The price of your faith
Fallen from grace

I leave no trace
But the remaining feeling
And with undue haste
You're set to reeling
Like a deep congealing festering wound
It's my reminiscent touch
That tortures you

But you can't recall the song
That's lost on the wind
Once it departs
To never return again

During lonely moments
You will solemnly reflect
Upon the endeavor of this vocation
To be dependable
When answering The Call for help

Righteously, it is assumed that vested within our intentions may be a demonstrative, direct altruism, allegiance, and adherence to a virtuous disposition.

However, this would in fact be indicative remotely of self-righteousness

Those who walk this path
Will never know a peak
Or a crest to achieve
For you are never over
And you are never through
When trying to be
Someone special

Rejoice in understanding
That it is within the arduous journey
That you may be granted
The less than prestigious
Yet priceless reward
Known as perspective

When you reach within
Do you find yourself
Descending an everlasting abyss
Or remiss to find your fingertips
Ascend past the glass ceiling
of Heaven

I find it kind of ironic
How the snow always falls
While ashes from charcoal rise

When you play with thoughts
That flood your brain
Do they elate your senses
Or bring you pain
Do you show on the surface
What's imprinted in your skin
Or leave the premise to be unwrapped
Then tossed aside once again

I began to write
So that I could know myself
And what I find
Is that I'd rather be someone else

Dead Inside

That's a flag that no soul runs to capture
It leaves you high and dry
Stranded alone
Staring down from the rafters
Wondering what went wrong
And then proceeded after
Which carries on into the very present Existential disaster

What is it that besets me
Perplexes my soul
To forever second guessing
Presetting the ridicule
And never ending questioning
With sharpened tips directed within

For my eternal conflict festering
My eager disposition
Reveals my meager position
Desperately inflicting
Conditioned precision
Leading ultimately to division

All while I'm asking why

Was this what I envisioned?
Did the pieces fit together
Like a perfect prism
Projecting nimbus clouds
Or simply bring the rain down
In my prison?

I get the suspicion
That there was no omission
While considering these propositions:

Maybe if I could be different
Then I could be divident
Blistered from the sun and innocent

Am I justified or satisfied
In all that I desire
When admitting each want
That's past transpired?

For the joys of life
Don't require far places to be found
Foreign grounds
Only offer exotic ways to suffer

But there's no coming home
When I'm pushing through alone
No one to love me while I'm alive
No spark of the falling snow
Meeting the burning charcoal
No ember
And nothing to remember
When I'm already dead inside

It's as though I've died
Yet haven't reached the end of my life Passing by unfazed
Through these phases ever changing
Taking kindness from strangers
When they offer their advice

Suffice to be content
With what's left behind
Acting on hapless sacrifices
Or sickening vices
Hollowing my inside private spaces
Until the point I disappear
Or otherwise remain faceless

A blank slate..
I'm ready to bear my own vines
To share this with you
Substantiate it over time
And let roots grow where they lie

If only you'd allow me
To take your hand in mine
I'd fit the mold
I'd fill that hole
Within your ripped apart heart
And never miss

I wish you to know this
That you have been
*The last dream of my soul

My zeal and consumption
Reveal the dysfunction
While determining each compunction Attained from my blind spot

There's no restraint
Only beligerant justification
Of how you somehow fit
Into the conducive picture
When I'm caught

And because I can't see it
I remain elusive
Telling you where the shoe fits
Telling you what the truth is
All the while preaching
That I'm so introspective
And also failing to ascertain
My own negligence

Sabotaging everything that I have
When I'm left feeling bad
By some kind of red flag
Raising false alarms
Sounding like the war
In my pin cushion heart

If I listened
I'd hear your quiet
Dismissive confessions
Instead of invisible projections
And the lies I tell myself
That have become manifested

If I had to guess
I'm sweating for fear of rejection
Yet you didn't even raise that question
It's the guise under which I hide
For protection
Revealing my true colors

I need to stop being so defensive
Of my never ending cycle
And take heed
That what's been (them)
Is merely ashes in the wind
While this (us) is revival