Trapped By You

Trapped By You

You and your baby ruined my life,

Not with intent, not with cruelty, just with arrival.

I was already standing on a fault line,

And the ground chose that moment to give way.

I did not hate the small breath in the room,

I hated how the air changed when you stayed.

Every future I spoke aloud went quiet,

As if someone closed a door mid sentence.

Love became a crowded space overnight,

No longer shaped for two imperfect people.

I shrank myself to fit the corners left,

Learning silence faster than forgiveness.

I watched you grow into someone I could not reach,

Hands always full, eyes always elsewhere.

I learned how invisible a heart can feel,

When survival becomes the only language spoken.

I stayed longer than pride would advise,

Calling endurance a kind of loyalty.

I mistook endurance for love itself,

And paid for it slowly, day by day.

This is not a curse, it is a truth,

Heavy, plain, and finally spoken aloud.

I was trapped by you, not by chains or walls,

By timing, by loss, by a life that was not mine.

Yet I did what any man would.

I stood by you and the child.

My child, and yours.

The tender baby we gave life too.