OF ALL THINGS TO ABANDON ME

Why couldn’t it have been you, Grief?

Not you, the black-veined thing,

the rot that sits where love once lived.

Not you, the parasite feeding off the echoes

of voices I’ve already lost.

You’ve made a nest of me,

and I let you.

Not because I wanted to—

but because I forgot what life was like before your hands

wrapped themselves around my throat.

I burned the photographs,

but your ash seeped into my skin.

I clawed at the memories,

but your claws were sharper.

And when I screamed,

you sat there, silent,

your silence heavier than any word

they never said to me.

You do not leave.

You cannot leave.

You are the only thing that stays

when everything else abandons me.

Every promise broken,

every word swallowed,

every love turned bitter—

and still, you stand.

If I threw myself into the fire,

you’d stay in the ash.

If I drowned in the ocean,

you’d stain the water.

And if I dared to forget you,

you’d remind me

in the hollow pulse of my chest.

Why couldn’t it have been you?

Why couldn’t it have been you

to walk out that door?

To take their betrayal with you,

to take their silence with you,

to take their love—

unspoken, unfinished, unbearable—

with you.

But no. You remain.

You sink your teeth in deeper,

your fangs dripping with the taste of every goodbye

I never wanted to hear.

You are not my companion.

You are my punishment.

And still,

I let you stay.

***REMI.***