maybe you let it happen because hearing the words
i love you
had more of a lasting effect on you than almost any other means
of self abuse you had tried to drown yourself in throughout your lifetime

maybe you let it happen because you liked being able
to escape
from all of the cacophony that had been
bumbling around in your head for weeks, months, years

maybe you let it happen because you were trying to forget
something
someone once told you while they were drunk and indifferent
sitting next to you at a bar, the kind of thing someone mumbles to you
right before they fall asleep and you're the only one who can recite it
word for word as if to savour the sting the next morning,
something you feel guilty for even remembering at all.

maybe you let it happen because you knew
that all of the terrible things that had been done to you
could never be proven, scientifically or otherwise
because you knew from an early age that
words were meaningless and you'd been living so long
inside the jaded surface of their hollow shell you needed
something tangible something or someone who would
scoop you up and eat you like ice cream
even if they only did it for the sake of their own
shameless unadulterated selfish enjoyment regardless
of the devastating consequences.

maybe you let it happen because you had been left
so many times you figured the words
i love you
were better than death itself
even if you knew those words were not real
even if the person who said them really never meant them
even if you never had the chance to discover
what that statement truly means
at all

but you would keep searching for it anyway
even if you kept finding it
in the wrong places
time and time again.