I have trouble expressing
why I needed to leave him -
reasons never seem enough.
He’s not evil,
my words seem so inadequate.
But my whole soul cringes at the thought
of going back.
I can’t really say that out loud, can I?

He lost capacity for emotion
For year upon year
Except for anger, withdrawal, resentment.
And yet, he did his job, his duty.
Lifelessly.

A friend said, watching me try hold it all together
was like watching me try to stop sand from
slipping through my fingers.
I tried and tried but it kept slipping away.
broken promises, broken lives.

Maybe if I did things differently
Maybe if I was better
Religious morals ring loud
for good, for bad
My vows felt like a trap
He counted on them, relaxed after that.

I didn’t count on the feelings
The abandonment
The bone sorrow
Creeping upon me.

I cannot express how
they accumulated until
I saw a ray, a tiny crack of love and
Knowing that existed showed me
I could never stay.
My marriage was illuminated as
bereft.

I held a memory of that ray
and needed to leave -
both for survival
and
to give him back responsibility for
his life.
That was too much for me.

But I look at my girls and I wish we were whole.
No reason seems good enough.

‘I’ve something to tell you...
I kissed someone else.’
‘You kissed someone else?!
That can’t be true, who?’

‘How could you not notice me,
you had many chances to see...
I don’t know what I want,
but this is honesty.’

He storms away, slamming door
out into the night. Then -

‘I’m sorry, your actions are yours but
it’s my fault you’re there...
please, I’ll get help, be your friend
I’ll get better, I swear...’

‘I love you’ says he
‘Why, truthfully?’
‘You’re so beautiful...
I don’t want to fail..’
But beautiful is a trophy, a conquest
and marriage isn’t a contest.

Actually, I now see
The kissing of someone else
was me, breaking free.
I’d broken long ago
his promises felt hollow
I was clutching at saving me.

My joy, our family, our life
all millstones to him,
burden and strife.
The endless trying, ideas and hope,
Fell on deaf ears - I was just the wife.

Then I stuck around, tried,
grief searing inside.
Let him touch me (excruciatingly)
give flowers and hold me...
but it was gone with old tides.

And simple jealousy tipped him?
Got to be kidding me.

I see the man
who is still my husband
many of the days.
Handover of children,
he looks so withdrawn.
He is hating on me
he looks to be suffering
I had to break free.

When we were together
nothing fulfilled him
or the hole in his soul.
I turned circus tricks
Look at that, look at this!
But any joy poured in
disappeared, black abyss.

I almost did too.

It amazes me
that my grief for another
has been stronger
than that for my husband.

How can that be?
A fleeting love meaning more
than a marriage,
than a life together.

I realise that I already
grieved desperately, alone,
lost, confused
within the marriage.

In the dark of a still December evening,
I sit staring out of my window,
At all the other windows,
Staring back at me.

A thousand different lives as seen through a lit window,
Snapshots of alternate universes,
Confined by lace curtains,
And lit with fluorescent suns.

In the dark of a still December evening,
We're all just lights behind a window,
Indifferent to the other worlds,
Coexisting across the way.

The bright moon shining as we lay,
You in my arms, it's been the perfect day.
Pin drop silence everywhere
We are together, I am here.

I open my eyes and you've vanished,
Calling your name, I am panicked.
I can still feel you, my dear
We are not together, I am here.

The advice was
'Support him,
try to help him.
He needs sleep when he’s tired
(even if it’s all day).'
'Try to talk to him,
he’s hurting inside.
Help him,
he needs you.'

I believed that,
and I tried.
I tried until
I felt almost gone
My words disappeared!
A glass pane formed
between myself and the world.

I didn't know
I could go too far.
Give too much support.
No-one says that,
who would have thought?

I didn’t know
support can become a crutch.
He could settle,
no need to improve.
Who would have thought?

Depression is real.
It just doesn’t mean
that you are first always,
or that you don't need to try
or talk to your spouse.
That was just -
taking advantage.

When he left me
his soul was gone for me
and his body was still there.
His anger was new
his distance was new
and his lack of touch too
I was so confused.
I was pregnant, then a mum.
Untouched, the silence dumb.
Bereaved, intense loss
Husband won't touch me
there's only frost.
How do I even speak of this?
he's doing the chores
but there's such an abyss.
Two years more
and I realise
depression brought
this demise.
Fool, it took me too long
to understand what was wrong
but this knowledge never did
bring back his song.
He remained, gone.