Alone Amid Ashes

I hate how this anger still consumes me – blocks me – breaks me down.  I feel like I have just been standing still – or falling down – for the past two years.  My fists are at the ready, but I strike out at all the wrong people.  I am the one left with the most bruises and scars; my own two hands are still pummeling me, ensuring I am wounded and defeated.  I need to shriek and shout this fury out into the open air and allow it to escape my offended body, where it continues to literally rip apart my insides with these fucking ulcers and abdominal pain. I can’t though; I stand here nearly mute, my voice now barely a whisper after all the wasted breath and determined declarations of the past.  It didn’t make a fucking difference to them then, yet it’s still hurting me now. 

I shake, tremble, sob with a rage that remembers like it was just seconds ago when their lies were accepted as truths and the life I loved, a life I struggled to build against countless obstacles, was unjustly taken away from me.  More doors closed – slamming in my face – and no open windows to be found.  Fear lingers in the heavy air and it stifles me – completely immobilizes.  I will never, ever be ready to make nice.  I sure as hell hope I can forgive for my own sake though or this anxiety, this relentless anger and fear, will crush me like a pile of bricks. 

I don’t mean to burn all these bridges.  If anything, I’m the one who is out there collecting lumber late into the night, hammering away to reconstruct boards and rails that have been ripped out from beneath my feet.  I don’t mean to burn all these bridges, but they know I’m a girl on fire and nonetheless they pour the kerosene all about under my footing, mocking and affronting me until I stand alone amid bitter, blackened ashes.

Are you out there somewhere, hiding behind a cloak hemmed of deceit and vanity, watching me with a smug smile and delighting in all the damage you have done?  Your gratification could mean my destruction, you arrogant piece of shit.  Instead of laying this anger to rest, I personify my resentment and permit this beastly, colossal creature authority over me – cleaving at my heart with sharp claws and gnawing at my strength with pointed teeth resting on the edge of baited, vulgar breath.

This is not what I want, so why have I given this anger so much power?  I don’t want to cry anymore.  I don’t want to hide under bed covers.  I don’t want to be so fragmented and faulty that I nearly consent to your defamations and thus confess lack of worth.  I don’t want this, but here I am – frozen, full of fear, faint, frail.  I want control; I want to stand victorious after all is said and done.  I need vindication.  I need release.  I need strength.  Instead, I crawl back into bed and weep with trepidation and trembling.