Don't Talk. Just Walk.

Don't talk. Just walk.

Did I walk away too soon?

Could we have fixed things---

Talked it out---

Found a compromise?

After what you said,

That you didn't know what you wanted

That you wanted me on your terms

That you had "no desire to change" your behavior

It felt like the answer was clearly stated.

Because I realized then,

That, to you, I'm someone

Who's not even worth a conversation.

And that tells me

That walking away was the right choice,

Even if sometimes it still doesn't feel like it.

Swimming Lessons

The thing about him is

I'm not "crazy" about him

But it turns out that's a good thing.

He and I--

We see each other fully.

We disagree.

We say ugly words to each other.

We struggle to understand.

But

We still love.

Every time I want to run away,

He shocks me.

He shocks me back to life

By staying even when it's hard--

Even when my emotions are tidal waves

That knock us both over.

He stays.

He stays

And weathers the storms with me.

He stays

And treads water with me.

He

Stays.

Oscar Wilde, De Profundis // @i-wrotethisforme // Jorge Louis Berges // @smokeinsilence //@viridianmasquerade //Jorge Louis Berges // @honeytuesday // Kaveh Akbar // F. Scott Fitzgerald // AKR //Olivie Blake, from “Alone With You in the Ether” // Kaveh Akbar, Pilgrimage

Hope Hurts

You came back for a moment,

But not in the way I wished you would.

You came back,

And I lost it

Because you didn't come back to stay.

Hope stabbed me in the heart again.

What I Wish I Could Tell You

I wish I could tell you to leave him--to run away and never look back. But I can’t. You still love him (the potential you’ve always seen in him). You still have hope that one day he’ll change--that one day he’ll buy you gifts on your birthday and comfort you when you cry. 

You’ve seen who he really is (an empty shell), but you don’t believe it yet. You can’t believe it because you still think that it’s you. You know you don’t deserve to be cheated on, insulted, and silenced. You know that...but you don’t believe it. You think, “if I just try a little harder and do a little more for him, then things will be better. He’ll stop hurting me”. But the truth is he won’t--because this isn’t about you. It’s about him, and it always has been.

 No matter how much harder you try or how long you wait, it will never be enough. A black hole is insatiable, and you are already running on empty. He will keep taking your light until you, too, are an empty shell--a husk of who you once were.

 I wish I could tell you that you’ll feel so much lighter once you’re free of him--that home won’t feel like a prison anymore and you’ll be able to breathe without the constant weight of fear suffocating you. 

I wish I could tell you that I know all of this because I’ve lived a story just like yours--that I, too, was afraid to leave despite knowing I deserved better. That I, too, betrayed myself over and over again all in the hopes of winning the love of someone who never even existed in the first place.

I can’t tell you this, and I won’t. But that’s ok--because you’ll figure all of this out on your own, in your own time. I know you will, because you are strong. 

They say I dodged a bullet, but why can't I believe it?