you do not get to call me now

with your ash-laced tongue

and trembling hands

and think I will forget

how you watched me burn

you say I almost saw the worst of you

darling

I did

you just didn’t look close enough

to see me

sifting through the wreckage

for the pieces you left behind

I moved mountains for you

crossed cities like rivers

hands open

heart raw

asking only

to be met with warmth

but you

you made ice look like mercy

don’t dress it up as love

what you gave me

was silence

withdrawal

the kind of absence that bruises

you broke me open

then asked why I bled

and now

you want to return

bearing poems and wounds

as if poetry can exhume

what you buried

but I am not your penance

not your absolution

not a stop on your pilgrimage

to self-awareness

I am the aftermath

that chose to bloom

the woman who rose

from your undoing

and stitched her name

back into her skin

so no

you do not get to say

I scared you

like it’s a compliment

you should be scared

not of me

but of how deeply I learned

to live

without your kind of love

go

carry your guilt

like I carried your absence

let it teach you

how heavy silence can be

I don’t want revenge

I don’t want forgiveness

I want peace

the kind that doesn’t wince

when someone says my name

and I will find it

not because you gave me closure

but because I stopped

waiting for you to