It scorched the Earth beneath my feet,
Forever tainted and augmented how I experience my world,
the world around me.

Things look different. Taste odd. Sound funny.

You can never go back. Never undo.

What's done is done.

And now,
Well, now,
You must live in the aftermath.

There has only ever been the aftermath.
  
The before time was a story you'd tell yourself to sleep better
        at night.
Stories of being Loved, Seen, Cared for, Known.
All fairytales that you'd gorge yourself on,
Imagine living in.

Anything to take away the pain,
Anything to make the loneliness stop.

As you grew, you leaned on other things to take away the
        feelings: cutting, eating, distracting, dissociating.

Make it numb.
Make it tolerable.                    
Livable.
It hardened you.
Broke parts of you.
While the world around you continued to take.

You tried to stay afloat.

Sometimes, flirting with the idea of going under,
Wishing and praying to let the waves wash you away.
Never letting them.

Always trying.
                        
Trying to rebuild from the rubble at your feet.

Some time, along the way, forgetting,
                                                                ­   it wasn't your bomb.
                                                           ­                                       
                                     You didn't detonate.

It wasn't your dilapidated, abused house - you Just lived there.

It wasn't.
It isn't.
It wasn't your fault.
It never was.