you shouldn’t talk to me like we’re familiar…
tones in your voice and the hope for love is too similar….
you make it harder to walk away…
torn between leaving and the desire to stay…
eighteen years old was the age I first left home to escape…
but your nightmares were the ones I unknowingly watched and taped.
I needed you in the same way I needed him to love me…
but he didn’t…
he didn’t…
and for many years I could never face the denial to fully see…
all the damage and abuse he was doing to me…
so much I couldn’t control….
no matter how I tried.
there were endless ways I could have given up…
chosen to permanently leave and die….
the broken parts in me wishing I knew why he couldn’t love properly…
why I imprisoned myself in his dark love and let it control every part of me.
forgiveness comes in pieces and I’m piecing together my life without him here.
love gave me the courage to face the greatest of my own fabricated fears.
Lauren Kim Art 