I once thought I was crazy
I doubted you were even real
I thought I was in a psych ward once
But reality has been revealed

I wasn't in a ****** bin
You and I had really met
And you did everything I thought
Now you claim that you regret

You beg for my forgiveness now
You say just one more try
But you made me think I was crazy
You made me wish to die

You lied and cheated and gaslit me
Till I was nothing but a shell
Then you left me for dead
You chose somebody else

It wasn't until I told you
That I had nothing left to give
I stopped giving you my time
And I remembered how to live

Now suddenly you need me back
News flash but I'm not blind
I finally see the truth for what it was
My whole world was realigned

You forced me to come to terms
With the full picture of us
And honestly I can not believe
I had ever gave a ****

To be a woman:

To be a woman is to bleed.
From between our legs, as young as nine, when the only worry in our young minds should be about scraped knees from riding bikes and scooters, the visceral meaning of womanhood begins to leak through the soft cotton amour of childhood.
The impending doom of what could be warded off by a child's imagination has cracked and no longer can be repaired.
This is the fate of a woman.
From that day we bleed.
Shoving gauze of soft smiles and politeness into bullet holes bore into our bodies by men.
Anything to stop the bleeding and remain a fragment of the person we once were.
We’re blithe in the presence of grown men that become aroused to the notion of humiliating us.
We try to feign ignorance and keep a straight face in times of turbulence to maintain modesty.
Our nails embedded into our palms, we bleed.
And a storm has formed.
Through the storm we seek the same refugee we watched our mothers seek. Always thinking that the outcome will be different.
This one is not the same.
We’re not our mothers.
Our love is different.
It’s respected.
It’s mutual…
as long as you’re the one doing the laundry and the cooking and the cleaning and you pay your half and you look after the child that you nearly bled out for.  
Nurturing, tending, cooking and cleaning and ‘whoops’ watch the knife…

bleeding.
Always bleeding.
It’s equal love though, isn’t it?
It’s what you wanted, right?
When you bore two children and you’re raising three, that’s what you wanted. That’s what you bled for.
That’s what you bled for?

Who has he bled for?


He walks into the kitchen, boots scuffing the linoleum on the way.
Dumping the scrapped leftovers of love you gave him in the early out of the morning into the trash and tossing the containers into the sink.
He pats the heads of the people he pretends make him whole and goes to the shower to rinse off the 10 hour shift of hard labor that didn't involve his family.

You don’t expect a kiss at this point because you learned that asking for what you deserve could come with a broken orbital socket.
So you let your heart bleed.
You bleed it into your kids.
You let them know that they are loved.
You pretend that everything is okay.
You go to work, you come home, you bleed and you bleed and you bleed.

Hopeful that your daughter doesn’t see.

I fell madly in love with you.
Your sweet compliments drew me in.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your soft kisses won me over.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your advice told me to listen.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your discipline made me better.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your harsh words caught me off guard.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your apologies regained my trust.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your bad habits became mine.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your anger made me feel protected.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your disappointment was immeasurable.
I fell madly in love with you.
Your love made me feel crazy.

I fell violently out of love with you.
Your sweet compliments stopped coming.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your kisses slowly faded to pecks.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your advice led me astray.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your discipline left me confused.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your harsh words stung like tears.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your apologies were double-sided.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your bad habits ruined my life.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your anger scared my childlike heart.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your disappointment made me feel even worse.
I fell violently out of love with you.
Your love made me feel unloveable.

Drive me to a cheap motel.
Pay for a week, the one after as well.
But what do I do when I can’t save up money?
“We’ll worry about it if it happens, honey.”
Daddy, I’m scared, and Mommy I’m tired.
If you push too hard, I might just expire.
I’m losing time, and I’m losing hope.
So I just tend to dissociate to cope.
I made three new alters in just the last week,
But you don’t listen, don’t know what that means.
I do want to survive, live, be alive,
But I’ll need more help if you want me to survive.
Please love me now, like I needed love then.
If not as a parent, at least as a friend?
Mom, I know you hate me. No, no, it’s true,
But the only person you hate more is you.
And Dad, I don’t lie when I love you I say,
But stand for yourself, not your wife, just one day.
You both have raised me, shaped me, molded me,
But the person you think I am isn’t the person I wanna be.
I’m your son, though I know it’s hard to adjust.
I find it hard to love and harder to trust.
The people who raised me, taught me, bathed me.
When I ask for acceptance, don’t make me say please.
In the end, we all need therapy, I think,
But don’t dismiss the truth I will speak.

Dear One… No. Feared One.
I want an apology, an epiphany. Why can’t you see what you’ve done to me?
You say, “I don’t believe.” *****, please! I see it in your walk, the pain in every step.
Do you hear it when I talk, the nights that I have wept? There is pain in every word
because none of them are heard. Past your bleeding lies, but I just use my eyes.
To see past your deception, every little false conception. Should I even mention
How you failed to mention that I am your reflection? Your twisted perception
Paints you as the victim. I am your creation. Why would you create me as I am,
but hate me as I became myself? You hate yourself. You see a mirror in my blue eyes, And your many lies are laid bare. I tear through the ******* to see you.
Alone and afraid of what you have made. Oh, Feared One, you thought I was done?
I have just begun. You’re not the only one who’s words are loaded like a rifle.
Other’s think it’s just a trifle, but your words are a weapon which you’ve chosen
to harm. Sound the alarm, but my f-bomb won’t do as much damage
as your constant brain hemorrhage.

The shadow in the mirror reminds me not of myself but of my father.
He stands behind my mother’s chair like an advisor to the queen.
He does not poison her mind or plan treason against her throne.
Her tyranny extends to the invisible shackles on his long-broken mind.

The ghost in the mirror reminds me not of myself but of my brother.
Though he has died, he never passed on to the better place he deserves.
His phantom lingers in my mind, trying to reach out and touch this plane.
He can’t feel the tender dew on the soft grass unless he uses my hands.

The witch in the mirror reminds me not of myself but of my sister.
Though she has left the inner coven, she is still trapped under her oath.
Her spells of cord-cutting and separation can only do so much against it.
As her mistress sleeps, her work to free herself from her bond does not stop.

The monster in the mirror reminds me not of myself but of my mother.
She controls our movements like a puppet on a string, never stopping.
There is no freedom to reign over my or my family’s actions but hers.
Her little marionettes may never break free from the suffering they endure.

There is this feeling I’ve never felt.
Given one less card when cards were dealt.
A constant gambling poker game,
Not for money, nor for fame.
This **** was rigged at the start.
The lost feeling was love, joy in my heart.
It’s taught by some mothers but never mine.
I pity the souls who were raised in kind.
I love others; don’t be mistaken.
But it feels like love for myself was taken,
Away by my mother, or maybe God.
Either way, I think it’s rather odd.
The way I was treated. The way I was raised.
The way that, despite that, my mother was praised.
My dad, he’s alright, but I think he should
Stand up for himself, for his own good.
It’s not my fault, but I’m given credit,
For my parents’ emotional deficit.
Regardless of where my poker game started.
I hope I can win, when I’m departed.