Your anger was the heat of sun,

Glaring down in focused loathing.

In anger and hate you stood,

An unsteady, frightening tower.

Your land was parched,

Polluted in heat, but

Shadowed in darkness.

A harsh wasteland.

When you loved at all,

It was a surprise of rain, brief,

A single drizzle of anticipation

Offered to a scorched land.

I lived there, in hope.

I opened my mouth, craving to taste

And tasted nothing but sorrow.

My ache for love expanded in want.

I hungered to your attention,

And your every expression

I etched deeply into my heart.

Standing, eagerly, I waited for a deluge.

My first love, in the heat of your loathing,

My heart became a shriveled thing,

Wilted with drought.

I remained parched,

Living in the poverty of lack.

And I began to know,

Standing in want of you,

Would never bring

Healing and life to death.

I began a search of years,

Seeking for you in others,

And only found a glaring mirror,

Ripping through my heart,

Drawing to me a replicate;

Your enduring legacy.

Lessons became creations in duplicate,

As similar presentations became a habit

My fearful and dismissive,

Anxious, little avoidant.

But then I saw my shadow, a remnant of you

And suddenly understood,

I could not find you in another.

In newness and time,

I've skirted your jagged edge and

Stand under my own torrent.

I swim in a flood of rain that is mine,

Completely separate from you,

As my heart expands to meet me

Where you could not.

The shadow of your glare wanes

And I find strength in this water,

Where love and acceptance of my forms

Has repaired what appeared broken

But was only ever tested.