he’s risky  
like a box of blueberries,
only the sour bits hit your tongue
just as hard as the sweet ones.

"one day i'm going to break down those walls of yours"
that used to sound comforting. that you would save me from myself. allow me to be vulnerable and be safe.
but now that sounds like a threat. you're going to crack me and watch me crumble. you'll pull out my guts and hold them in your hands. you'll have power over me now, and i'll be vulnerable. you know i'm scared of that.

I wake up with a stabbing pain,
I force myself to wake up from this nightmare,
and when I finally look in the mirror...
"Wait, what? How did that happen?"

There's violet and crimson marks on me.
They're encapsulating me,
making me feel like I deserved this,
and I did.

The shrinks in their ivory towers tell you
To not be afraid,
Stand up for yourself,
Show them what you're made of, and to
Never back down.

I'm pinned to the floor,
and my legs are paralyzed.
I was left in a puddle of my own pulpy, ****** mess.

and it's my fault.

His voice echoes in my mind.

"Maybe if you didn't act this way, I wouldn't do this,
You're a terrible person and I feel sorry for the people who think you're not. Nobody loves you. People would throw you out in the street if they knew what you've done."

That was the night that he took everything from me,
He took my freedom,
He took my ability to communicate,
He took everything from me,
And he doesn't know why.

Sometimes, I don't know why he does these things.

Isolation consumes me like cable news telecasters consume the minds of sheep, and everyone is programmed to think and act as if the world is coming to an end.

Everyone acts like a victim.

There's two parts to such an accusation;
Victimization
Survival

But, there's a third part that no one tells you about.
Coping mechanisms

I can't stand up for myself.
"You're worthless."

I can't show them what I'm made of.
"Nobody loves you."

Berating, belittling, and biting me with your words.
It shows more scars on me than your fists.

"Why do you do this to me?"
"You must not care about how I feel."
"Why are your crying? Are you pitying yourself?"
"Have you realized that what you've done is wrong?"
"When will you learn?"

I'm not your child.
I'm not your lover.


Make a safety plan,
Get out while you still can,
Don't blame yourself.

You have every right to react the way you want
When he's not treating you right.

Don't let him gaslight you.


You've been through this before.

Don't let him get to you.

You're better than that.

You

are

a

survivor.

if i had three wishes
one of them
would be to take back
every single touch from you
that has laced my skin.
another one
would be to take back
every single word
that you whispered in my ear.
the final one
would be to forget
that i ever knew you,
and forget what you did to me.
but maybe i dont wish that
because, yes,
you ruined me,
but because of it
i wont let anyone else
do the same

Do you think she’ll witness my downfall
When she goes to hell?
Do you think she’ll feel the anguish of empathy?
Do you think she’ll find a way to introspect
Instead of projecting?
That would cause her suffering.
I won’t be grouped in with fools
Who discharge ressentiment
With dreams of those who’ve wronged them
Suffering more than they have...
But I know it must discharge somewhere.
What constrains me?
The stunted superego
Suffocates the id
Holds it down and kicks it;
A child beaten
Tells itself
It doesn’t want to hurt its family
Until the day it’s realized
That it can’t.
And then, its spirit broken
Lays dormant, a pressure cooker
Tells itself it doesn’t want to rise
To cope with having fallen.
It stays silent and still long after left
Alone.
Retreated so far into itself
That now it fails to recognize
The threat is gone –
The abuse goes on
Long beyond it’s ended.
She told me she loved my poetry,
That I inspired her to write
About her father.
I should have seen it coming then
It was no different from before -
I let myself be used again
I have no excuse.

This is the last line of the poem.
You got there
But you don't get it
You really do need help.

Because this poem rhymes.
You just missed it.
Go back, check.
You still don’t understand?
Well, you’re delusional.
You really do need help.

It rhymes. It’s a Sonnet. Sonnets rhyme
You are not all there, trust me
It’s in iambic pentameter.
If just because you don’t get it you try to make me the villain,
It would be so hurtful since I’m helping,
You really do need help. Let me help you,

You think you know better than me...I’m the poem
You must be insanely arrogant or just psychotic
To think you know better than me
You aren’t even reading me. We already established that
You. Aren’t. Reading. This. Poem.  It’s about butterflies
You really need help.
As the first line of the poem says,
“Why would I lie?”

I told myself I wanted all of her
But I never wanted her blame shifting
Her gaslighting
Her traumatic bonding
Her disorientation
Her playing the victim
Her cruelty
To happen
And it would be easier to cope with
If it actually hadn't.

It would've been easier
If I'd been the crazy one
Because then I might've had the power to fix it
If again I could go back to the time
When I clung to her lap
And she ran her fingers through my hair
And said, "Your head's really ****** up, isn't it?"

If I could go back to my "data acquisition"
And be okay when she refused to give me answers
When she refused to tell me what we were
Or if I meant a thing to her
So I couldn't hold her to expectations
Or have them
Because I meant nothing to her
But she couldn't tell me that until I tried to end it
She just let me say "I love you," and didn't say it back
(Except for the few times she slipped just to keep me trapped).

She told me that it was all in my head
And then that I wasn't imagining anything
In the same paragraph.
She told me she was "over this"
But wouldn't tell me what "this" was
When I was the one crushed under it.
She let me chase that conversation
And played with me
And told me, "You're just going to have to be confused then.
This is my straight forward response.
The truth is, I'm sorry but you will have to deal with it."
But I didn't want to deal with it.
I just had to.
And all I wanted was the truth
But I still don't have it
And I don't know how it can stare her in the face
And she can still deny it

I don't get how she can torture me for months
And not have the decency to say, "Yeah, I did it,"
So I can rest.
I don't get why I still need her validation
Why I still tried so desperately to get it
Why the army behind me isn't enough

But it has to have something to do with her saying,
"I am not your ex. I am nothing like your ex.
You need to be able to collect the data in front of you and dissociate from past trauma.
Seriously,"
Every time I tried to defend myself from her actions
Until I stopped trying because I was too busy trying to analyze my own
Or, "You tell me all your thoughts,
I go through them with you
Confirming. Or. Denying."
Like she was the omniscient authority
The objective standard by which the validity of my feelings and perceptions were measured.

I think it's because
It'd be easier to cope with
If it hadn't actually happened,
So I convinced myself it wasn't happening
And I'm still struggling to believe it.
It'd be easier
If it was all in my head
Because then I'd have something to be certain of
(Even if it was only my uncertainty)

And I wouldn't have to admit to myself
That I was in love with a sociopath.
I wouldn't have to wonder
Whether or not she did it on purpose.
I wouldn't have to face the fact that I feel abused and broken
And empty
And like there's a hole in me I'm not sure how to fix
That I allowed to be drilled there.