What was I thinking wasting my time with you
I can’t wait to shed my skin
I can’t wait to give to it to the wind
You ****** my soul and left me thin
I can’t wait to shed my skin
What was I thinking letting you in
You took my heart and left my head to spin
I can’t wait to shed my skin
Seventeen years wasted, gone like the wind
Just like a scorpion it hurts, when you sting
I can’t wait to shed my skin
No more tears I won’t give in
You’re a Narcissist, I won’t let u win
I just can’t wait to shed my skin
Filled with feelings of misgiving
I won't fall for your gas-lighting
God please help me to shed me skin
I Pray, I Pray for a new beginning

she'll convince you it was your bark not her bite, even when she holds your ****** body in her maw.
​
— don't believe the beast

And then we weren’t.

I learned more about you in our ending than I did in those two years

One minute you were my  Heathcliff.
The man that I had looked for all of my life.
The next, a paltry reproduction. All of your pretty words dispersing like the death of a Tempe dust storm.

I will make peace with never understanding.
I will cease longing for something that never was.
I will heal

But I will always wish that I didn’t have to.

I will not stand by while abuse happens
six months of cyclical hell
the push and pull of your desire
insatiate

this issue has never been singular
confined to some imaginary private space
in the public view of us all
using your circumstances to justify
the victimisation of another
to the point of collapse

the coloniser builds a fort
because they're afraid
of their own violent mirror-image
projected into the landscape

do you recognise
yours?

I know what I said;
I know what I did.
Here you are claiming
It never happened.
I know how you are;
I know your routine.
Here you are claiming
You're not any different.
Here I am, alone,
In my perception.
Am I crazy,
Or just a victim of clever deception?

I wish that the first time I spoke to you,
I had one hand wrapped around the leather strap
tethered to my dog's collar,
instead of leaving her home to worry
and allowing my hands the
freedom to tear myself apart in
front of you
because finally tearing myself down
felt like a wonderful thing to do.

I wish I'd had her with me
because she has always been
the one more likely to trust her gut
and warn people like you to stay away.

I wish I'd had her with me,
because I know that she would not
have let you take a single step towards me
even if I wanted to let you close.

I still remember the way you would
sweat nervously
at the thought of my hanging around with
my friends who did not like you.
If you were so worried about them,
I am sure you would have been all the more
terrified of her.
Not because she would bite you,
not because she is dangerous.
But because she is not fooled as easily as me.
She would have sensed the danger,
pulling me farther away
than was comfortable for you to imagine.

I say this not to be cruel,
but rather to speak out loud
a thought which has
fluttered through my mind all day,
the corners of my lips curved
in my own quiet amusement.

My dog wouldn't have liked you very much.