Disputed Property

I can be just yours. In that I can give everything I have right now to you. 

But along the way I gave little pieces of my heart to some people from whom I can't take it back. 

I try never to see them again. 

Once I'm gone, I try to be gone. 

Remain gone. 

Because every time I see them. Any of them, I go back to where I used to me. Those parts of my heart that I never took back come alive again. 

I go back to wanting to cause mayhem and get arrested just for his approval. 

I go back to sinking down to my knees so it's easier for him to drag me across the floor. 

I go back to holding her close while she cries herself to sleep. 

Because I have never understood why I walked away from any of them. Especially since the path to away was littered with hot coals and gravel. 

But I walked away anyway. 

Sometimes because staying was more painful than permanent damage to my feet.

Others because just the act of staying was so overwhelming I forgot how to be sane. 

I know I did the right thing. 

Each time. 

But I don't carry with me all my things when I go. 

I leave little bits of my heart with the people who shook me into walking the tightrope with them.

Because I don't know how to take my heart back. Not after I stripped it completely bare and let them own it. 

Let them toss it on the floor and trample all over it. 

Let them grip it a little too hard so I always felt a little breathless. 

I don't know how to take my heart back. 

And I don't know who owns the little fragments that I gave away all those years ago. 

But it's not me. 

And as much as I'd like it to be you, that isn't true. 

There are little bits of my heart in forgotten old tin boxes in the homes of the people I once loved. 

And I know they still have them. 

Because each time I see them. 

Hear them. 

Smell them. 

Go one step too close for comfort. 

I feel myself cower, 

To the power, 

They still have to break the little pieces of my heart. 

And each time I find myself back on my knees begging them to strike the hammer. 

Because they know, like you do, 

That hurting me is the only way to love me back. 

And I wish I could take back the power to hurt me, but for the life of me, I can't figure out how.