Unsafe Words

I often wonder,
if people ever stop to think
about what their words leave behind.

If blaming someone
over and over
ever quiets the war
they carry within themselves.

It's strange,
watching someone dissolve
into a person
they were never meant to become.

The anger.
The lies.

The things that once
made her heart tremble,
don't even reach her anymore.

She asks for kindness,
yet her tongue has learned
to sharpen itself on other people.

Not being able to handle
a hard conversation.

But if difficult conversations
are something to fear,
imagine what silence breeds.

The words left unsaid.
The apologies never spoken.
The distance that grows
where honesty should have lived.

I suppose no one taught you that.

Then again,
I'm not your mother.

You should be old enough to know
that avoiding the truth
doesn't bury it,

it teaches it to haunt.

The strange thing is
your words never stay with you.

They leave your mouth,
find a home in mine,
and echo there for days.

When I tell you what they do to me,
you don't deny the words.

You deny my feelings.

As if you've lived inside my mind,
as if you know my heart
better than I ever could.

Maybe that's the cruelest part,

not being hurt,
but being told
the hurt doesn't exist.

Defensiveness
is a beautiful disguise for guilt.

It builds walls so high
that even the truth
can't climb them.

So today,
I'll stop knocking.

Every line that could have been crossed
was crossed.

Every warning ignored.

Every silence chosen.

Be happy with what you've built.

I hope one day
you realize

that unsafe words
don't always sound like screaming.

Sometimes they sound calm.

Certain.

Convinced.

And by the time they're finished,

there's nothing left to say.

You still live in a world
built from teenage storms,
where pride is louder than understanding
and silence feels like winning.

As if growing older
were optional.

As if you could return
to those years
and never have to learn
what accountability costs.

Maybe that's why
every hard conversation
feels like something to escape,

instead of something
that could have saved us.