You may have damaged my soul
But you don't get to steal my art

It's like I've been trapped in a sea of snow
Frozen into nothingness
Numb to feelings and new experiences
Unable to process anything
As my energy slowly depletes
Leaving me feeling less and less alive.

I have just recently learned how
To elbow out some room to breathe
Some room for me
Just enough to give me hope
Just enough movement
To break cracks into the ceiling.

Hairline fractures barely let in the light
But it's enough to feel a sense of warmth
A fire ignited in my stiff bones
My frozen limbs and organs
Slowly beginning to thaw.

It's hard to know what to do with it
This anger that's much more
Than the nothingness that came before it
I've learned that I have to pace myself
Too much and I'll burn myself
Not enough and I freeze again.

But I am angry.
I'm angry at you
And I'm angry at me.
I just want to be free
From this cell of ice that you built for me.
The one I helped maintain
Because you had your nails dug so deep within me
That I cut myself when you left
To mimic that torment
To attempt to function
Through the withdrawal.

The pain you inflicted fueled me
Made me feel alive
And hurting myself couldn't even compare
Because it wasn't enough.
It wasn't you.
It wasn't us.

I was addicted to your energy
To the power you held over me
To that chaos that mimicked my past
So much so
It felt like home.

And that's where I struggle most
Because history repeats itself
And I should've known
That there was never safety in that home
Just emptiness and loneliness
Anxiety and pain
The need to lie to everyone
To ****** or suffocate pieces of myself
So that I could survive
To be whoever anyone needed me to be

Because I didn't matter
I didn't even exist
So why am I surprised to feel that way again?

Although I've survived this **** before
Now my survival skills are
What keep me frozen in place
And learning to love yourself
Feels way more painful
Than learning to hate.