confessions

what i never said was that i
loved you from the start
and how i hated that i loved you, so i told katie
that i didn't think you were that cute or even that appealing in general.
and i never told you how much it hurt
when you pushed yourself past my clever barriers, forcing me to open up
like a well from which sprung a multitude of
fucked-up secrets i had kept locked inside a box of bones for so so so long,
crying over them every night when no one was
around to see me be weak
and i never said how unfair it was for you to have
done that to me,
to have made me someone i swore to never be: completely attached to someone else,
sloppy in love, to the point where every word i said was
love and every song i sang was
love and it was all the same meaning just in different
syllables. i was the child of a divorce. i know what love brings,
i know it becomes nothing more than pictures in a box and
sneaking out late to be held in arms where you really don't belong.
but every time i tried to run from you you caught my wrist,
pulling me back, turning me around even when i thrashed,
looking at me hard and whispering "come here and just fucking trust me for once,
i won't hurt you, i'm not just another boy and i never will be to you"
and i broke under the pressure of your words,
folding into your arms like a flower
i showed you each scar and you traced every single one with cool fingertips,
staring straight into my eyes as you did so, your breaths heavy
as if you were the one in pain,
like you could erase the fine lines with nothing but your love
and some empathy.
no, i'll never say any of that to you but
what i will say is this:
you taught me how to be disappointed,
you showed me how people really do always let you down,
and because of you i found that yes, i do have the strength to lock myself
in the highest tower, in a castle of ice, where no other man may ever find me again
and i cut off my hair and gauged out my eyes
and i will turn each sorrow and pain into another rage,
a stone in the wall i'll build between me and this bitter world.
but by the world, just know i really mean you.
i always have.
i always will.
and i hate myself a little more for it.