The Flames of Resentment | A Poem

RESENTMENT

Samantha Nagel

From: Empowered

I need you

But I don’t know if I want you.

You need me

And I know I need you to want me.

There’s a secret compartment in my heart,

One where water overflows and

Salt stings the wounds.

I cry in secret.

Every word is cataloged,

My body like a library of memories.

The tears, the voices, the hands on my body,

Captured in my spirit.

Have you ever picked at a scab

And it never healed?

You picked,

You peeled,

You bleed more than you had to.

You never even let it scar.

I was taught to want fear over rage,

That anger was a bad word.

The fires I set,

Only to put out with my hands

Before anyone noticed

Have burned off my fingerprints.

The sight of the flames makes my heart race,

The idea of love makes me vomit.

I am raw,

I am naked,

And I would do anything for a blanket.

Years of harboring pain

Has taught me that I am special,

That I am better.

I am above

The need for love,

I am above

The need for connection.

My brain exists in a different dimension than my heart does.

I don’t remember

What it feels like

To hear my heart beat.

The fire I have been deprived of

Consumes me.

I live in a chasm of heat,

I exist in a sanctuary of warmth.

To forgive

Is to excuse,

To accept

Is to stop fighting.

My hate has given me a home.

My space has given me abundance.

My resistance makes me whole.

No one ever told me

That the walls don’t just keep you in,

They also keep others out.

I haven’t been touched in months,

I am cold in my bones.

When the flames escape me,

When the fear leaves me,

I know that I am empty.

An abandoned home that no one cares for.