You are no longer my god;
I went through hell to demote you.
The person I love most is in hell now
and you never were his god.

Your ability to hurt people
Is truly amazing
And it’s all in the name of love
Your love, authorized by your supremacy.

I am shaking with anger.
This is not love.
You are not my god.
You are not
The Almighty
The All-Knowing
The All-Loving

Do you know I blamed myself?
I thought I gave you the crown
and the golden scepter
and knelt at your feet.

But it was you, and my fault
lies in the trust I gave you.
You crowned yourself, you took your throne,
You pushed me to my knees.

In my younger years I built a wall
It kept me safe and it kept you out.
But you taught me of my rebellion
And I craved the love you promised.

I repented and I gave you my heart
And you crushed it in the dirt.
I put up a boundary this time,
determined not to shut you out completely.

We built friendship, love, companionship
Until you broke what was left
of my offering to you.
I put up another boundary.

You have reduced your right to me
to a surface conversation.
I dignify my enemies with more.
But betrayal leaves irreparable scars.

When I was a child
I used to close my eyes at night
and see your smiling face
as it contorted into wicked laughter.

I am afraid of you.
I am afraid of the you
That I see in me.
I question my own sanity.

We see you in ourselves.
Effortlessly, we learned to hurt
and control people with our words.
We see our capacity for evil.

But there is a difference between you and me.
I search for the evil in me and
over and over and over again
I give control to the God of pure love.

When I was four I betrayed you.
You said, “I can’t trust you anymore.”
“But when?” I pled, feeling the guilt build.
You shook your head with sadness,

“I don’t know; not for a long time.”
Those words still haunt me.
You never told me you trusted me again.
And you didn’t, when I did and didn’t deserve it.

I trusted you
Because you told me to
Because “I know what’s best for you;
I know you better than you know yourself.”

Nothing is safe with you.
You have the memory of an elephant
But you “forget” your role as confidant.
You were supposed to be my secret-keeper.

You taught me your definition of love.
I believed you, and it still feels true.
But when your god betrays you
The path to truth feels like sin.

Because your love is the ultimate ethic
It has confined my love to internal distance
The truth would break you, and I do not want
to hurt you in the name of my love.

Until your definition of love
is in submission to something other
than your feelings, your supremacy,
the truth remains unspoken.

You are my Mama and I have lost you.
I can hardly see your ghost through my tears.
I can’t fix you, I can’t make you see.
But I will love you until the end of my final breath.