What I Would Not Become

The arguments never lasted long.
That was what bothered me.

A sharp sentence.
A raised voice.
Then quiet.

Like nothing had happened.
Like nothing needed answering.

I started to notice
how easily things were smoothed over.
How questions became politeness.
How silence passed for peace.

The house was good at keeping things contained.
Doors stayed closed
because no one insisted
they be opened.

At first, the quiet felt like relief.
No conflict meant no damage.

But nothing was healed.
It was only covered.

When I learned the truth,
it didn’t feel like shock.
It felt like clarity.

I understood how one woman
had already been put away
so the rest of the story
could continue.

She was inconvenient.
So she was hidden.
Her absence made everything else
seem possible.

If I stayed,
I would not stand in the light.
I would be his secret.

I would live on permission,
not right.

Nothing would disappear all at once.
It would go slowly.

A silence accepted.
A future half named.
A role
I could never fully claim.

There would be no clean moment
to leave later.

The damage would be too quiet
to point to.

Staying
would mean agreeing
without speaking.

Leaving wasn’t brave.
It was necessary.

I refused to become evidence
that this could work again.

Outside,
I had doubt
and hunger.

But doubt was honest.
It asked
what kind of life
I could live with.

I walked on
without knowing
where I was going.

I only knew
what
I would not become.

Language & Logic