Your Love, My Pain

I think I loved you before I knew what love was; what it meant and how it could be used as weapon when it should have been a shield.

But because I loved you, and you said you loved me I never entertained a thought that could have saved me.

I was yours and it’s taken 10 years to realize you where never mine, I was in this alone, but your “love” made me blind.

But because I loved you I never questioned you, because I loved you I was silent when you caused my pain, and years after you your actions became my consequences.

Because I loved you I found myself confused when gentle love was offered to me, and because I loved you I always turned it away.

The chaos, pain, manipulation, and lies that was us became so ingrained into my being that I find myself craving it. If it’s not painful it’s not worth right? 

Wrong, I was so wrong. Pain is apart of love, apart of life. But when all your love is all my pain, and my shame, and my suffering, and my fear, you’ve turned love into something it was never meant to be.

You turned love into a tool to control me, hurt me, silence me and make me afraid of my own heart that still pounds at the memory of you.

But because I love me, I healed from your wounds, drowned out your voice with praise, and found my strength when I walked away. 

Because I love me, I don’t belong to you anymore and I am free to redefine the love you sullied. 

Because I love me, I am free.

And because I love me I can love after you.