My Words

I am a poem

And you are perfectly literate

You raked over me

Pouring over my stanzas

And analyzing my metaphors

You scoured me

Until you could make any meaning

You wanted

And then with your friends

You laughed at me

You laughed at the silliness

of how naive I was

How stupid and cliche

And uninspired I seemed to be

Did they know how gently

You lingered on my words

Gaining comfort from me

when everything else

Had failed you

Did they know

How you cried behind closed doors

How I brought down your walls

Like nothing else

And when I no longer affected you

When you found

no more comfort in my words

When you weren't brought low

By me anymore

You tossed me aside

You burned my book

And put my ashes in the trash

But I have a secret

I am not a poem

written only to you

I am words that were made

With infinite potential

And I was always more

Than how much I gave to you