Dear my lover,

Your whispers slither out of your mouth

Like a snake.

Each one striking at me,

Puncturing a hole

Through my wall of self confidence.

 

Your ability to hide behind a mask

That only I can see through

Makes you dangerous.

But not to others.

To everyone else you are

Smiles and hugs that make them feel at home.

To everyone else you are warm socks out of a dryer.

 

But to me.

 

Your words sting,

Like a hot shower does when I’m sunburned

Your disapproving nods

Peel each layer of me apart,

Until there’s nothing left to pull at.

 

Your silence is unsteady,

Wrapping me up like a blanket

And then suffocating me.

 

With each sunrise.

A new version of you appears.

Unlike a sunrise though,

I don’t know what to expect.

A loving person,

whose company I could bask in like the sun.

Or,

Should I expect the version of you

That hates everything I am.

The smile you used to say brightens the room

Now irritates you because,

I “Can’t be that happy”.

 

Each day with you is like

Spinning in circles

And then trying to walk a straight line.

Like Walking a tightrope

Above a pit of sharks at dusk.

 

Loving you has brought me joy

And pain

But loving you has brought me the strength

To put myself first.

To leave you.