I do not blame you
For having hands too calloused
Perhaps you felt holding me with them
Would be too rough against my skin
I could not understand then
That you are like a refugee of civil war
So wounded by your own
That I looked like an enemy too
And how much your insides
Must have done battle against themselves
In trying to make sense of love and hate and anger
I wonder if you can see now
How every time you yelled at me
Because you loved me
It caused my growing psyche to confuse
Fury and kindness
And how I trusted men who told me
They yelled at me
Because they loved me
And how the hurt and affection felt the same
I am sorry that my spine just couldn’t withstand
The crushing of your ultimatum devotion
That I had to tear myself free of you
Because I could not withstand its rigor
Could not let myself be squeezed into something
Smaller than I am
I’m sorry that I could not let you win
I will not hold against you anymore
Being the hole in every picture
The empty seat at every event
For not communicating your interest
In ways that I could point out to others
To prove something to them
To myself
I mistook your concern for criticism
And could not see your sober heart
In your drunken words
Could not fathom that you could be afraid
To unleash all of the tremendous turbulence
You hold within
I remember the first tears I ever saw you shed
And how they were for my mother
How you had disappointed her
And how my heart cleaved against my chest
With sorrow and rage and confusion and love
And thinking that this is how you must feel too
I’m sorry that I was born a daughter
Made so much in your image
That our stubborn words echo against each other
And that our throbbing hearts
Confine us to suffering a silence
That we never truly will understand
Please know that my forgiveness isn’t
Just putting the weapon down
But learning how to kiss the person pulling the trigger
And I am getting closer to forgiving you
Every day
For having hands too calloused
Perhaps you felt holding me with them
Would be too rough against my skin
I could not understand then
That you are like a refugee of civil war
So wounded by your own
That I looked like an enemy too
And how much your insides
Must have done battle against themselves
In trying to make sense of love and hate and anger
I wonder if you can see now
How every time you yelled at me
Because you loved me
It caused my growing psyche to confuse
Fury and kindness
And how I trusted men who told me
They yelled at me
Because they loved me
And how the hurt and affection felt the same
I am sorry that my spine just couldn’t withstand
The crushing of your ultimatum devotion
That I had to tear myself free of you
Because I could not withstand its rigor
Could not let myself be squeezed into something
Smaller than I am
I’m sorry that I could not let you win
I will not hold against you anymore
Being the hole in every picture
The empty seat at every event
For not communicating your interest
In ways that I could point out to others
To prove something to them
To myself
I mistook your concern for criticism
And could not see your sober heart
In your drunken words
Could not fathom that you could be afraid
To unleash all of the tremendous turbulence
You hold within
I remember the first tears I ever saw you shed
And how they were for my mother
How you had disappointed her
And how my heart cleaved against my chest
With sorrow and rage and confusion and love
And thinking that this is how you must feel too
I’m sorry that I was born a daughter
Made so much in your image
That our stubborn words echo against each other
And that our throbbing hearts
Confine us to suffering a silence
That we never truly will understand
Please know that my forgiveness isn’t
Just putting the weapon down
But learning how to kiss the person pulling the trigger
And I am getting closer to forgiving you
Every day