I’ll never be the same after you

I should hate you.

For running,

and taking your reasons with you.

The questions left behind

like little thorns of the mind.

I’m trying like hell to pull them out

hoping to spot the warning signs missed.

Why couldn’t you help me understand?

Why didn’t I deserve the reprieve?

How were you unfazed by my bleeding?

I should hate you.

For discarding my heart and history

as if it were throwaway cheap.

The way you disposed of my spirit

left me shredded.

Cut to ribbons that I’m sewing back together.

I’ll never be the same after you.

You didn’t leave me better off than you found me.

You stole what we shared.

It’s unnatural to move on from someone who resides inside me.

I can’t shake loose or free.

The painful truth is

I don’t want to forget you.

I won’t act as if we never existed.

After all this time together,

all this life together,

you detached with such ease

that I must have dreamt it all. 

What I wasn’t prepared for -

choking down answers I’ll never receive.

Your indifference is brutal.

Something reserved for savages.

All decency is disposed of

once someone decides to run.

Fiendish for distance between you and them.

No long goodbyes.

Nothing resembling a semblance of closure.

Their own embarrassment brings about avoidance.

I should hate you. 

See,

needing to do what’s best for your life,

at the expense of mine,

doesn’t make you right.

Quite the opposite.

And what’s most troubling is how often 

I still think of you.

I still imagine hypothetical scenarios

of you coming back around.

Showing up on my doorstep. 

And how I’d react to your negligence.

What would you say?

What could you possibly say that would fix the damage done

where I’d even take you back?

Anything.

And really,

I hate myself for that.