you shifted the situation that whenever i spoke to you all you felt was such formidable hurt.
you chose silence over vulnerability,
and i don't blame you.
the unrequited love i receive from you has shaped me to realize how incapable you are of loving me.
it cost me my authenticity.
the feeling of wanting to speak but then having to consider the hurt that would come with it...
i chose to quietly surrender to loneliness.
and i'd rather do that a hundred more times if it meant i wouldn't have to keep filling my own wounds with even more heartache.

i wish i never met you.
it's not because you hurt me,
but because loving you has been the most
silent, isolating and lonely kind of suffering i've ever experienced with anyone.
if i had known from the start that my heart would end up aching for someone who could never be mine,
i would have turned away before it was too late.
where am i to store all this heartache?
i have spent so many nights wondering what it would feel like to be the one you chose.
and yet, despite everything, i still love you.
even though it hurts.
even though it's hopeless.
if loving you meant hurting like this,
then i hope i never learn to love again.
i should've known you were never mine to keep.

if loving you means hurting like this,
then i hope i never learn to love you again.
you stole my vision of love,
but worst of all - you stole my vulnerability, my heart, and the love i had to offer.
so much of my time wasted, so much of my energy drained.
i should've known we were going to be a story unfinished.
i'm stuck with someone else now,
and the unusual thing is now i'm just like you: unable to love them.
while you remain the person i struggle to forget,
i've become the person who used to hurt me.

i used to be so vulnerable and honest.
but after having so many people take advantage of me,
i no longer recognize myself.
i started lying in hopes it would protect me.
now i can't stop because i'd rather lie than be honest about how isolating it feels to actually be me.
the things i want to say i push to the back of my mind and continue with my life because it hurts less and i think less.
but even then...
i continue to swallow the isolation that fills up every bone in my body.
the things i want to say / i swallow.

i was angry at the whole world because you couldn’t love me.
i couldn’t bare myself to accept the truth,
the truth that i really was just unlovable.
and the worst part: i’m never the one that falls in love first - i just end up being a prisoner in love.
i was angry at the world for continuing to spin while i had to mourn.
why couldn’t the world mourn with me?
how could the world keep spinning when mine had stopped?
but i realized something…
i wasn’t really angry at the world.
i was angry at myself for having so much love for you that all this love had nowhere to go.
where am i to store all this heartache?

i don't think i'll ever stop thinking about you.
i miss when i would be the one you told first the exciting things that's happened to you.
i miss how it felt when you would hold me.
i miss your touch more.
i wonder everyday if you think about me too.
i wonder everyday if you miss me or if you've moved on.
i wonder if the distance between us right now hurts you too.
you are the only one i could ever love.

with every attempt i've tried replacing you with
other men and random people i have no intention of having a relationship with.
but still. i feel empty.
YOU make me feel empty.
the only adrenaline i feel is when i'm thinking of you,
when i'm thinking of when you used to love me and when i used to love you.
there's only one question i'll always carry:
what was it about me that made you fall out of love with me?
i still think of you.