Was he abusive?<\/p>\n
No
\nYes
\nNot exactly
\nIt\u2019s complicated<\/p>\n
Did he ever hit you?<\/p>\n
He threw me into a wall once
\nI was on his back, grappling for keys
\nTo keep him from going back to the bar<\/p>\n
He twisted my fingers so hard to get them out of my hand
\nThat I felt the bones protest,
\nAnd feared they would break<\/p>\n
Did you ever hit him?<\/p>\n
Oh yes
\nFrequently<\/p>\n
He would drink and I would cry
\nHe would take my car
\nAnd I would walk to find him
\nDrag him from smoke filled rooms
\nFeel pitying eyes on me
\nFeel judging eyes on me
\nFeel annoyance at my presence<\/p>\n
There she is again,
\nDragging her drunk boyfriend home<\/p>\n
I\u2019d take him home and he would cry at me,
\nAnd scream at me
\nAnd I would slap him
\nHard
\nFor the simple pleasure of trying to hurt him
\nHurt him like he hurt me<\/p>\n
Only I couldn\u2019t hurt him like he hurt me
\nBecause the only hurt I could give was physical
\nAnd the hurt he gave was so deep
\nIt left scars that are never going to heal
\nIn places no one can see but me<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a chasm in the center of my chest
\nThat opens up whenever he crosses my mind
\nAnd though it\u2019s been years
\nI can still feel myself tumble into it
\nThat sickening feeling of falling
\nJust for a moment or two<\/p>\n
Why didn\u2019t you leave?<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t know
\nI never knew
\nEvery time was the last time
\nEvery day was a chance to start fresh
\nEvery promise, a chance to believe<\/p>\n
He needed me
\nHe would die without me
\nHe wanted to be better
\nAnd I wanted to believe him when he told me so<\/p>\n
And still don\u2019t know why<\/p>\n
And I had nowhere else to go<\/p>\n
I hated him with the whole of my heart
\nEvery ounce of my soul
\nI prayed for a car crash
\nAlcohol poisoning
\nBar fight gone wrong<\/p>\n
I wanted his death
\nAnd sometimes my own<\/p>\n
Just to be free<\/p>\n
How did you get out?<\/p>\n
You know\u2026
\nTo this very day\u2026
\nI\u2019m still not sure that I did…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Was he abusive? No Yes Not exactly It\u2019s complicated Did he ever hit you? He threw me into a wall once I was on his back, grappling for keys To keep him from going back to the bar He twisted my fingers so hard to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":905,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[1726,1725],"class_list":["post-23322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-half-marathon-poem","tag-abuse","tag-alcoholism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/905"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23322"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23371,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23322\/revisions\/23371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}