Monster

I can become the monster you call me.
Embody the villain you perceive me to be.
All because I am unwilling to become everything you need.
Unwilling to sacrifice self on the altar of your greed.

Incessant neediness.
You, clinging like death to a bullet.
Suffocating me as I try to surface too fast from this abyss you call love.
Miss me with this love.

I’m running, hiding from your selfish lust in the caverns of my heart.
Putting up walls of resistance to repel the dead love you would send to knock on my hearts door.
Some part of me wants to let you in because underneath the rotting flesh of despair is my man.

I love you.
That’s not enough.
I desire you.
Not enough.

When I see you some part of me lights up and I’m full.
My feet can’t carry me fast enough to your embrace.
Still not enough.
Never enough for you.

You would be my god, I your slave.
The arms opened in love become claws ravaging my flesh, tearing away at my soul.
What you want I won’t give.
What you need I don’t possess.

I love you, cried, tears like blood and it’s still not enough.
Your words, sharp like a rapier piercing me with guilt.
If I truly loved you…
If I needed you

If; always, if.
Always a stipulation, some fine print I missed when I signed.
The weight of our commitment is too heavy.
There is no more joy in our love.
Even if it kills me, I’m fighting to the surface.

 

I’ll be the monster you call me.
The bitch you hollered at me.
I’ll be her.

I’ll be the liar, because surely I never loved you.
I’ll be the whore, because when I opened myself to you, I had an agenda.
I see the light dancing on the surface and its calling to me.
For my freedom, I’ll nod and be who you want to say I am.
To break surface and take a clean breath, even if it’s my last,
I’ll love her.

I’ll embrace the monstrous lying, whore bitch you see when you look at me.
I’m thankful for her.
She sees clearly, eyes wide open.
Her clarity gives me the courage to keep walking when you call to me, begging me to come back.

You need me.
A lie.
You love me.
Not the me you see, but the me you keep hoping I’ll conform to be.
I won’t.

The monster isn’t a trick of your eyes or a fluke of your imagination.
The monster you hate,
The monster you want to leave, is me.

(c) Pamela Shropshire 2012