There Is Room for All of You Here

by Michaela Angemeer

i’m grieving my father but he’s still alive and i don’t know if i’ll have any feelings left when he dies

all they know about me is that i’m alive they pretend i still talk to mom and see her when i cry

i’d much rather get the news that someone has died than someone is dying i don’t have the words for this part and the only thing worse than saying goodbye is standing in the doorway for an hour

i miss my mom the most when i'm sick she never saw me whole but she knew how to love something that needed fixing

i don’t wanna live up to my parents’ expectations so they know how it feels it’s too bad they taught me how to please everyone but myself sit, down, stay i was always obedient until i strayed i wonder if their new dog is a good boy i wonder if he’s doing a good job of replacing me

no i don’t know how it feels to grow up feeling safe i didn’t learn how to feel my feelings until twenty-eight now i know i was scared all the time

i thought by thirty i would be able to let go forgive and forget or at least move on but the truth is you can still see shrapnel in my smile can still hear eggshells when i walk the only difference is now i get to be angry and i think part of me always will be

why do i have to make my anger agreeable like i'm not allowed to be mad unless i immediately tie it up in a bow

hurting you would hurt me more

look at how you’ve grown even without the sun

you rewrote all my old poems erased the hurt made me feel like love was always this easy and now everything i’ve ever written is about you

my nervous system is finally learning what it’s like to feel safe check engine light off maybe i was always ok maybe there was never anything wrong with me to begin with

in loving like this i didn't know there would be so much to grieve for the past love i never received

ouch

falling in love makes me feel like i’m in my mother’s body when i look down i see her hands when i look in the mirror i hear her voice in my head feelings of unworthiness are so loud hyperindependence screaming at me how could she teach me how to rely on someone when she never could how could she show me what it feels like to be safe when she never was

i got so used to stumbling bending over backwards falling but when it’s just me and you i finally feel like i’m landing

our love is warm. our love is soft. our love is endless. our love is ours.