I should feel more than this
but as a legacy from you
it fits

empathy and anger are concepts to me
puzzle pieces I try to fit in the hollow inside me
but they do not feel like mine

you do not feel like mine

and the truth of that is jagged
rough and corrosive
because it has more flesh to it than anything else between us

but emotion is hereditary
I must give to mine what you gave to me
and I am empty handed

but not empty
which counts for nothing when all I feel is locked inside me
wrapped up in words and handed to strangers
who cannot understand the weight of them

and now my children bleed
from wounds no mother should inflict
and I watch their pain and I am
frozen

because I have no language for this

and I realise that maybe this was your truth
that this was all you had to give me
but not all you had

so maybe this empathy and anger I hold is yours

but emotion is hereditary
and I do not want these words to be rewritten
by those I love the most
so I will learn to give my words to those who need them

because I do not want emptiness to be my legacy