When You Work Up the Courage to Apologize, Read This Instead
i. Everyone told me you would come back, and here you are, months later. Here you are, mangled and bruised and expecting a truce with little effort on either end of the fire. Keep waiting.
ii. I swallowed rose pedals and spit out bullets. You collected them, locked, and loaded. I know I did not say all of the right things, but at least I said something. I trusted you to use your teeth, but you used your legs instead. You spread them so wide, you didn’t even exist. I didn’t know that even bats have soft jaws and run from what they scar.
iii. Every day for months, I wrote down something I loved about you on a napkin and saved them like silver dollars. I burned them with everything you ever bought me when I learned that life is not about love or money. You will never find someone who loves you more than I do, but if I could burn every memory of you, I would.
iv. Last time, I said I was sorry to a dial tone. This time, I deleted your number and two years worth of text messages. Every day I wake up, I say goodbye to a ghost. I don’t need the texts as proof that you loved and you lied. You demonstrated where the fault lies through your actions.
v. I don’t care if anyone is on my side. I am not here to make judgements for others. I am not afraid anymore. Three years ago, your presence made me shake and it took weeks to scrub his blood out of my skin. I am not afraid to stand up to the pain.
vi. You are not worthless, but you are not worth it. I wrote 15 poems for you in your absence. That is over 15 hours I will never get back, and notebooks full of words wasted on someone who will never understand what they mean, someone who wouldn’t even listen.
vii. This is not for you. I don’t do things for you anymore. This is for me.
viii. If this poem was a letter, it would be addressed to Mr. with no return address. If this poem was an earthquake, you would come out with no limbs. This poem is a tsunami, I am the broken houses, and you are the flooded streets.
ix. The last thing you will remember me as is the elephant tattooed on my thigh: I am stronger than I was, and much more wise.
x. Your new girlfriend will come back. So will the others. I won’t. So when you work up the courage to apologize, please don’t.
