A Reason

Eventually you get tired
of playing the victim.
In my situation,
we were both.
Both the predator,
both the prey.
And then there was my first love.
But it was never him,
it was the drugs,
it was his childhood.
It was her childhood.
Couldn’t I love someone
with a normal childhood?
“She’s been working since she was three—”
“Doesn’t matter,”
the psychic cut me off.
I felt the need to defend her,
to protect her.
I always did.
She didn’t like it.
Or so she said.
No knight,
no shining armor,
no such thing.
It’s only you.
But alas, no excuses.
But maybe,
just maybe,
a reason.
Her past,
his past,
my past,
his past.
Yeah, him too.
Our parents.
Yes, them too.
Or without them,
the lack of them,
a bond broken too soon.
Who was he?
I didn’t know.
A baby forgot her father.
I forgave him.
His deathbed.
Forehead to forehead.
Generation after generation.
A cycle determined
not to be broken.
Trauma passed down.
Trauma recreated,
re-enacted,
re-imagined.
Trauma, trauma, trauma.
But eventually you get tired
of playing the victim.