Hands Tied II

What is my place in this?

What do I get to claim?

Do I get to call it abuse if you call it love?

Do I get to hate him if you keep choosing him?

Am I still your friend

if I can’t smile when you say his name,

if I don’t pretend this is normal,

if I don’t pretend I don’t see?

You don’t ask for my opinion.

You don’t ask what I think when he grips your wrist too hard,

when his words leave cuts you cover with silence.

You only ask me to understand.

But I don’t.

I can’t.

I don’t know if I’m allowed this anger,

this sickening guilt,

this helplessness that tastes like failure.

I don’t know if I have the right

to want to pull you from his arms

when you keep walking back to them.

I tell myself it’s not my choice.

I tell myself it’s not my place.

But then I hear you cry through the walls,

and I wonder—

If I don’t stop this,

if I don’t scream,

if I don’t fight for you when you won’t fight for yourself,

then what am I?

A friend?

Or just another coward,

waiting for the worst,

pretending I couldn’t see it coming?