So how did you feel?

So how did you feel?

anguish
/ˈaNGɡwiSH/
severe mental or physical pain or suffering.

How did you feel? Not that I care or worry about you, as a matter of fact, I’m thriving and flourishing without you
but I just want to ask, how did you feel?

How did you feel, when you felt big and bad like the great big wolf
that feeds on the emotion sad
yet lacking the qualities of a mother, instead, lost and mad?

How did you feel?
When you used words of destruction
to kill a relationship that was once trusted
a relationship a young boy tried to replenish
with pieces of his soul.
Instead fell short, and now he’s trying to refill his bowl.

But did you ever notice?
Notice that the roof which we resided in
that once thrived with life
where love was flapping around with its wings so beautiful

Turned cold.

Wings now shrunken to dust.
With love now locked away, never to be shown towards you again.
And now the inside of that roof is a dark, cold, empty shell
of spiritual warfare and a perpetuating feeling of hatred
that’s induced throughout.

How did you feel, watching my little sister step into shoes
she should never have been forced to wear?
She was a child, but you made her grow up too fast
turning innocence into responsibility
her light dimmed under the weight of your absence.

And my little brother
he barely had a chance to know what love could be.
He’s too young to even put words to the scars you left
but they’re there, etched in his silence
in the way he looks for reassurance where you failed to give it.
He shouldn’t have to question love
but thanks to you, he does.

Do you even think about them?
About the tears you never wiped away
the laughter you silenced
the trust you shattered before they could even understand what it meant?

How did you feel when the warmth in our house froze?
When the walls turned into silent witnesses to your destruction
and we stopped looking at you with love
only indifference
only pain?

You built this.
Brick by brick, word by word
you tore apart what was once whole
and for what?
To feel powerful? To prove something?

But here’s the truth
you proved nothing but how empty you are.
And as much as you tried to break us
you failed.
We’re stronger now. not because of you
but in spite of you.

So how do you feel now?
Knowing that your name holds no weight here
that your place in our hearts
isn’t even a memory worth keeping?

I’ll tell you how I feel.

I feel nothing for you.

And I hope you live the rest of your days alone.
I hope every door remains closed when you knock
every voice stays silent when you call out
and every reflection in every mirror shows a face
that will never recognize love again.

I hope the nights are cold and endless
that every moment is a reminder of what you lost
but you’ll never admit it
because to admit it would be to face the reality
of how broken you truly are.

I hope you rot there
in the dark
in your regret
in your failure.

Because you don’t deserve redemption
you don’t deserve peace
you don’t deserve a second chance.

And that silence you feel now
that’s what you’ve earned.

  And here’s the thing I finally see about you
something I couldn’t put into words before.

You see yourself as untouchable
a queen in your own throne of mirrors
always needing to shine
always demanding we look at you and admire the reflection you created.

You lived for the power of control
the illusion that your words could twist and mold us into whatever fit your narrative.

You prided yourself on strength
but strength came in only one form for you:

The power to destroy
to manipulate
to reshape memories
to make us question ourselves
but only because you couldn’t face your own emptiness.

It took years to figure it out but here it is:
you ran from your brokenness by building walls
by twisting affection into currency
by making sure our worth was always a game of conditions
always based on your rules
always dangling just out of reach
because if we stayed chasing
we’d never stop feeling the void you forced upon us.

And yet, despite your game
I see you for what you are now.

A broken reflection of someone trying to convince themselves of their greatness
a stranger incapable of self-awareness
chained to your need to be adored but unable to find peace
always looking in the mirror and asking, "Why can’t they see me?"

And now I know:

You’ve always been lost
but you made sure we were too.

I wish I could feel sorry for you
but I don’t.

Not anymore.

And yet… here’s the part that stings.

You were our mother.

Or at least you were supposed to be.

But all you ever gave us was a lesson in survival
in building walls to weather storms
in learning to live without the warmth you should have given. Instead proven to by our father he was the one who wanted us to keep striving.

And that’s the cruelest truth of all—

You could have changed it.

You could have chosen love
but you chose yourself instead.

Now that choice is your legacy.

Now that emptiness is your only inheritance.

And in the end, isn’t that fitting?

Because love was never yours to hold
and you’ll spend the rest of your life trying to convince yourself it was.

But we see through the lies.
We see through the mirrors.

And we’ll keep walking
without you.

Forever.