Since you ignored my pain
and met it with silence,
maybe I should too.
Maybe if I stop speaking my hurt
it’ll stop echoing in the space between us.
Maybe if I smile enough,
pretend long enough,
the ache will fold itself back into me
and you’ll think we’re okay.
Day by day,
I’ll learn to ignore the pain
act like nothing happened,
like the distance isn’t swallowing us whole.
Maybe that’ll fix us.
Maybe that’ll shut me up enough
for this to feel like love again.
But the truth is
I don’t feel safe loving you anymore.
I flinch at your softness
because I know it never stays.
You’ll break me,
and move on like it was nothing.
Because you can.
Because you did.
And I’m still here,
stuck in the ruins of everything I thought we were.
I keep asking myself what I did wrong,
what part of me wasn’t enough
for you to stay,
for you to choose me fully.
And it kills me
knowing you’re still searching for “your person,”
while I keep trying to convince myself I could be her
if I just held on tighter.
I wanted to be the one
who made you pause,
the one who knocked the wind out your chest
and made you forget every name before mine.
But it’s not me.
You’ve shown me that
in every silence,
in every almost-love you gave.
I wish I’d seen those parts of you,
just a little bit of romance,
just one moment where I didn’t have to beg for your effort.
I’m tired of feeling stupid.
Tired of waiting for something
you’ve already told me in every way but words
isn’t coming.
So I sit in silence,
loving you anyway,
hoping the feeling fades.
Hoping one day I’ll either become
everything you want and need
or finally have the strength to walk away
when I accept,
with shaking hands,
that it was never me.
