At the end of a relationship,
I think I'm reminded of something.
It's a simple truth really, hidden while we're together.
I hate myself.
And when we were together, I didn't, because you loved me, and you were a part of me, and at least some part of me loved me,
I thought.
Can love just die the way it did for you?
Are you even in pain?
I can't tell any more. I think you just want to leave me behind, because I remind you of the part of you,
That still loves me.
Despite the darkness, despite the pain, despite the sheer stupidity,
That part of you lives.
Maybe I'm just telling myself that,
You've had no trouble moving on.
I remember you were so upset with me once,
For not taking time to move on from you.
Look at you now.
There's no time like the present when you're running from the past.
I want to take a year, to talk.
To tell you, through words and actions, that I'm sorry.
I want to fix this massive hole in my shriveled heart,
The one that you put there.
I want to fix us, this incredible beautiful thing we had.
I want to move on, but the demons of my past are putting walls in front of me.
I break down whenever I think about it for too long, not just about you.
I break down when I remember how my father used to hit me for crying, and then hit me more for crying more.
It was a cycle.
I remember when I thought I couldn't love, so I lied to myself until I could.
I remember cold hands in the dark.
I remember the knife, and the blood.
I remember the numbness of staring into the cosmos, and feeling nothing but terror at the smallness of it all.
I got good at burying it, all of it.
Very, very, very good.
I built a dam to hold my emotions in, with the military discipline Aba taught me.
I learned how to drain them into the ocean, just before it overflowed.
Now...
Now it's overflowing with nothing at all.
Because you keep walking to the gates,
And knocking them down,
Until the things I forgot I could feel are raw and exposed in the light.
You don't want me to die, but I don't think you love me.
Love is patient.
Love is kind.
Love is patient.
Love is kind.
Love is patient.
Love is kind.
But you abandoned me,
Right in the nick of time.
I meant it when I said "I love you", despite what the dam was hiding.
But you didn't. You couldn't.
You never needed to build a dam,
To keep the feelings from flow,
Because you know what it's like,
To feel, and let go.
I was taught, day and night,
To hold and to hide,
To never let out all the pain that's inside.
I learned how to numb,
That won't go away.
I can't learn to feel,
When I feel more each day.
I want to believe they mean nothing to you,
but you're wrong if you think that I didn't love you.
