Once, I loved a man
with the fury of rivers.
They told me faith was the answer,
that prayer could stitch back what had torn.
But I could not kneel before a defiance
that never answered me.
And thus my silence became the house pet —
fed scraps of denial,
told to sit quietly,
told never to bite.
It grew fat on my unsaid words,
sleek with all the screams I swallowed.
It learned to curl on my lap,
its weight pressing my ribs shut.
It slept at the foot of my bed,
licking the wounds I would not name.
Some nights it grew restless,
pacing the dark rooms of my chest,
snarling at the locked doors.
And I —
I hushed it with lullabies,
with the trembling hands of a girl
who still mistook patience for devotion.
It grew old with me,
its fur heavy with dust,
its ribs showing through the thinness of years.
Still, I fed it with the crumbs
of forgiveness
I could not give myself.
And I told myself
You made me drown.
But here I am, still breathing —
underwater...
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