Vital

coerced

when you said, "I love you"

I remember thinking it was so rushed and so unexpected

I apologized and asked for patience after what I've been through

I felt like such an annoyance, a heavy burden, but you weren't even frustrated

you were cool and collected -

loving and persuasive, but not without intention

I broke my own rules to try and keep your attention -

because eventually I could say those three words back to you -

and I feared the day you would no longer say them to me

Once you have it, it's very hard to let go -

but this was merely fun and games to you, God, I know -

because you dream of outsiders and you latch onto anything that suits your cravings

and I'm so ashamed that I let myself become that out of the fear of no longer having you

Worst of all, I couldn't say you had made me, you didn't

You always asked if it was all okay, as if you could tell it wasn't

I forced myself when I was under the impression we were meant to be

I regretted it all when I realized it was all for nothing

You could lay there in bed, drift right off into your thoughts

I tossed and turned; I felt like I had dug my own grave

I scratched and dug at my low ceiling until the suffocation gave me pity 

- and we'd wake up, separately, trying to shrug off an individual haze

You would ask for my body, and I'd ask you to hold it

Your grip was so loose and I'd imagine myself to be a porcelain plate

I was just waiting for one false move until I was dropped and shattered -

made to scatter across the floor as new, sharp pieces that refuse to be touched again