What Love Looks Like 11/16/17

What does love look like?
Is it patient?
Is it kind?
Is it staying up late just to talk,
Cause you have someone to help unwind?

Supposedly it doesn't envy,
So why did he?
It doesn't boast,
Like the way he bragged to strangers,
About all the things we did,
Underneath the sheets.

It's not proud,
Just like he wasn't.
If I wasn't doing what he wanted.
If I dared to make my own choices
Then that love for me?
Became unwarranted.

Love doesn't dishonor others,
So how dare I tell him no.
How dare I be so selfish
Anytime I wasn't in the mood,
How could I call what he did to me coercion?
If my frozen silence,
Was obviously me saying yes?

Love isn't self seeking,
So of course I lost myself.
Love isn't easily angered,
So of course his anger didn't exist.
Even when I could see it,
Like the bruise he left on my arm.
When just a look from him,
Could bring me to tears.
But these weren't real,
How dare I have so many unnecessary fears!

Love doesn't keep record of wrongs,
That's why I had to forget.
He had to turn that gaslight on,
To shine a light on my incompetence.
I was "crazy" and "too sad" all the time,
why couldn't I just see our love through the dark?

Love doesn't delight in evil,
It holds on closer to the truth.
Is that why he thought that,
I would cheat on him?
After all I was just a liar,
Cause I "made up" him raping me.
That was just another one of
my overreactions escaping me.

Love always protects,
So that's why he couldn't let me go.
When he grabbed me so hard in the hallway,
That bruise he left on my arm
was just to show,
All the love that we had.
How could I walk away?
I had to trust him,
Had to hope.
After all bruises heal,
But how could we
if I dared to ever take my space?

Love never fails,
But he did.
He failed to love me.
Because he couldn't let go of
what happened to him as a kid.
Because he saw me as an object,
as an extension of him
rather than myself.

This is how he tried to teach me
What Love looks like,
But I'm reclaiming this image.
He was not what Love looks like,
And I am not to blame
for his damage.

-Liz