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Remembering Who You Were
It must have been like poison was injected into me,
And I forgot who I was
I forgot that all the beautiful things about myself
Were still there.
And I forgot about who I am outside of the perception of others.
Buried underneath resentment
And now I understood all the women who let it eat them alive
And now I understood all the women who got angry at the grocery store
Who ended up alone
Who didn't want to be seen anymore.
And I let that festering wound start to change me
And I let all the people that I felt like I couldn't forgive, start to alter the way that I saw even a stranger
All the hatred that I had for my mother, that was what was spoiling me, not the damage. Not the act. But the hitch in my train of thought that loops around the pain. That remembers how much it hurt. And what it means about myself. What it must mean about myself. The pinch in the narrative of who I am.
It's letting the damage, damage you again and again and again and again.
It's realizing that you just spent the last week on your commute arguing with her in your head.
It's realizing that hatred is becoming a baseline.
Your resting state.
When I used to look at people with kind eyes, and they used to always ask me what I was smiling about.
I miss smiling for no reason. I miss scaring people with my kindness.
I miss who I was before I ever met anybody at all.
And maybe that's why we all want to be innocent.
I miss who I was before I heard every single criticism that could ever be voiced on every single video that I've ever seen blasted at my eyeballs on full power for hours straight, everyday, for years. And now I have a chorus of mothers, telling me not to feel too much, telling me not to feel in the wrong way, telling me not to show myself, but if I hide myself I'm a coward.
I think I used to be loved, I think I used to be capable of being loved. I think I still am, but it's layered under mask and mask and mask and mask. .
