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Burning eyes,
tears running down her face,
he tore her heart out again
as he put her in her place.

Pain racked her body
and hate-filled her mind,
but she couldn’t let it out
because it wasn’t the time.

Another day in this marriage,
another day with him,
she hated his whiskey breathe
as he climbed within.

Holding her down,
covering her face,
fighting for air, how the hell
did she get in this place?

Sitting in the bathtub
alone and afraid,
looking at all the marks
his ***** hands made.

Rage building, consuming within,
watching the blood swirl in the tub
and knowing her sweet baby girl,
was gone then…..
~
Not only is Domestic violence Abuse, it’s Abuse that can also harm a child in the womb. Domestic violence and abuse can happen to anyone, yet the problem is often overlooked, excused, or denied.
Madilynn Sep 2017
I will never admit what you’ve done to me.
I will never speak of the nights I’ve spent,
In front of the mirror
Asking myself why I had to live in this horrible body.
I’ve lost count of how many times
I screamed at the top of my lungs
To make my voice louder than yours.
To make my voice just like yours.
Now my words sound just like yours.
“You’re my strong girl”
Hands on neck.
“Stupid *****”
Glass broken.
“I love you”
Black eyes.
“You don’t know anything”
I saw it all.
I heard it all.
I felt it all.
This goes out to all the children of domestic abuse. You may feel invisible but I see you. I am you.
Madilynn Sep 2017
"What was hell like"
The little girl asks me
With eyes full of innocence.
"Hell is growing up in a house that only taught hate,
But have hope darling
Because I've seen heaven.
Heaven was learning there is so much more."
moziq Aug 2017
Give me a reason to love the way you fist connects with my jaw and your boot to my shins.
Give me a reason to enjoy the taste of blood pooling in my mouth.
Give me a reason to smile at the bruises on my sides and my thighs.
Because I can't  seen to find a **** good thing about the hate you spew out of your lips and express in your fist,
but tell me that you love me and all the "baby I'm sorry's.
Theres a cycle of pain that never ends,
a line between love and hate but you don't know the difference.
Now you want me to find pleasure in the bullet i've bitten but there is no more me.
No more me to say another **** "baby I'm sorry".
White Owl Jul 2017
As I watched my mother get beat,  as a child,  I was convinced that if I were to call the cops something bad would happen.
I have watched my father slam my mother in a car door.
I have watched as my father threw pans at my mother.
I have seen my mother walk out covered in bruises.
I have seen my father break a printer with my mother's head.

I remember running to my room crying and covering my head with a pillow. Hearing him curse at her calling her every bad name he could think of. My brother and I would blare the radio and still hear screams of my mother,  as she was beaten.

We were young when it started out; I don't remember a period of time when it was not happening.

My mother tried to leave him time and time again. My brother and I begged of her. Just leave him, we would cry.

She was with him 18 years. She was put through Hell for 18 long years.

Peoples first assumption is why didn't she leave, why didn't she stay away. This was a question that,  even to me,  was hard to see; I just recently was able to understand and see what was wrong with this picture.

She was beat physically but she was abused emotionally as well. People only tend to see what they can literally see and forget what is laying behind the bruises. Day after day she was degraded, called names, told she was worthless. She began to belive it. It was now in her head that she was worthless and no one would love her. No one would put up with her, she was a *******; or so she thought.

Taking the courage to leave that is a lot, she was mentally unfit for certain jobs and her health began to decrease. She was a woman who felt that she could not succeed or provide for her children without my father, or another man.

Leaving my father for the last time was the hardest thing that I believe she had to do. She wasn't just leaving anyone. It was the father to her children, the man she has relied on for 18 years, the man that had her believing she was worthless. He done everything except brainwashing to get her to stay.

Also, my father is kind sweet and caring to everyone outside of our family. Even to our family he was nice but he had times were things of this nature,  behind closed doors, would happen.
My immediate family was not the only ones who knew he beat my mom. Everyone on my fathers side of the family knew. They always made excuses or turned their heads. Some people on my moms side had questioned it but she always made excuses because she thought that she loved him.

Domestic violence is nothing to joke about. Everyone should know the signs and report anything suspicious. There are a few things to know. The person being abused has to want help to get out. The cops and social workers can not do anything unless the abused come forward when approached about it. The exception to that is when there is kids involved, like in my situation.

Domestic abuse hotlines:
1-800-799-7233 | 1-800-787-3224 (TTY)

Not sure if it's abuse?:
http://www.thehotline.org/is-this-abuse/
Domestic violence does not only harm them in the present but haunts them in the future
R A Lee Mar 2017
She once was a great Oak tree but
She has been cut down
with every lie
You're not smart enough, you're not pretty enough.
She has been cut down.
One branch, two branches,
a slap in the face
another branch splinters another branch breaks.
You're to small now, like a sapling you are not strong.
Leaves begin to turn, her spirit withers like leaves in the winter.
Fists swinging as if they are axes
cutting deep
blood flowing like molasses.
She has been cut down
Down to a stump with nothing left,
but the scars that bear her story and hide her broken heart.
She has been cut down.
Pauline Morris Mar 2017
Locked up tight in a lover's cage
Easy target for all his rage

Lies being continually fed
I love you was said
Caught in his web

Sweetly tainted words he continued to weave
How was I ever that ****** naive
Blindly continuing to believe

Moved far from home and friends, freedom firmly suppressed
Long sleepless nights and days of no rest
As his crazy obsessions slowly manifest

Walking on eggshells till the next rampage
Locked up tight in an iron cage
Easy prey for all his rage

Never really knowing why or when the next attack
One word taken wrong, my jaw he would jack
Kept constantly pregnant, so I couldn't fight back

I realize from the outside looking in it's hard to construe
People say leave, but they haven't the slightest clue
But here on the inside, he means every death threat that's spewed

They just don't know that type of griping fear
Of keeping your children safe and near
While trying to hide all the violence from their eyes and ears

What if I left, tried to break free
Would he **** me, like he promised with glee
Would the kids survive, there's no guarantee

I know if he raised them, they would surely be twisted  
As adults would they follow in his steps, also be addicted
I fear their view of love would grow so sadistic

I was determined to get my kids out of his hellish cage alive
One day my opportunity did faithfully arrive
Leaving him to rot in his own putrid cell, while watching us thrive

               NEVER AGAIN

Will I be locked up in a lover's cage

               NEVER AGAIN

Will I be an easy target for rage

©Pauline Russell
Aaron LaLux Oct 2016
Could have wrote a whole book about you,
but instead all you get is this one poem,
and as lovely as you are you have all the signs of crazy,
so no this is not exactly a love poem,

it’s a lesson in the form of prose,
about abuse and about healing,
about hurting and learning,
and how we emotionally evolve,

post trauma no drama all problems solved,
no commas till Nirvana I am The Man Who Sold The World,

a young **** unplugged I’ve been through it all,
so I when she said she’d smack my mug I just  shrugged it off,

when I say She I mean You and that’s the truth I mean come on,

we were at the most beautiful view in Lisbon,
sitting together in the grass,
and I know I shouldn’t have mentioned Russia and Crimea,
but I’d swear I thought you asked,

alas,

could have wrote a whole book about you,
but instead all you get is this one poem,
and as lovely as you are you have all the signs of crazy,
so no this is not exactly a love poem,

it’s more of a heated horror story,
a heartwarming tale of cold shoulders,
written by the waning light of the summer moon,
the pen is the sword that hews the stone until the tablet is hewn,

I’m a poet I know this so I wrote this to you I just hope it’s not too soon,

could have wrote a whole book about you,
but instead all you get is this one poem,
and as lovely as you are you have all the signs of crazy,
so no this is not exactly a love poem,

this is a poem,
about learning not to care,
about being able to look someone right in the eyes,
and pretending like you don’t even care,

worse than pretending,
really not caring,
please I wanted you to bring some inspiration,
but all you brought was doubt and fear,

so I set you down,
as quickly as I had picked you up,
I let you go,
as quickly as I had held you close,

so,

so what,
you taught me not to care,
when I was feeling the most vulnerable,
is exactly when you chose to strike,

why?

I mean,
what happened to yesterday’s yesterday,
when we met under that wise old tree,
at that festival in Portugal,
where we feel so infinitely free,

where I invited you to spend time with me,
so we could together experience this miraculous creation called life simultaneously,

you’d accepted my invitation at the Oriental Station in Lisbon on that restaurant balcony,

I had asked where you were going,
and you’d said Madrid then back to Cypress,
I asked you why you were going back,
and you said you didn’t know,

so I invited you to a magical place called Sintra,
where we could have space to explore,
magical gardens with magnificent plants from the four corners of the world,
secret white sand beaches with just us the black rocks and the white sand,
castles in the sky and initiation wells winding into the earth,
drink from from the eternal springs which spring from the fountain of youth,

this is all true,
everything I’ve written here,

but you sabotaged this passionate plot before it even got started,
it started too fast I wanted a time out instead we ate at the Time Out Market,

I feel sick to my stomach,
I brought you to an angelic place to watch the sun set,
and what could have been a beautiful healing experience turned into nothing,
I feel sick to my stomach,

why have we done this,

why have we become this,

what can we take from this,

what’s the lesson from all this,

if you know please tell me,
because I haven’t got a clue,
and I’m as alone now as I was before I met you,
and I’m sitting here in my sorrows writing this sonnet staring at the waning moon,

and I could have wrote a whole book about you,
but instead all you get is this one poem,
and as lovely as you are you have all the signs of crazy,
so no this is not exactly a love poem,

it’s a lesson in the form of prose,
about abuse and about healing,
about hurting and learning,
and how we emotionally evolve…

∆ Aaron LA Lux ∆
A Bittersweet Love Letter
Pauline Morris Sep 2016
I lie and watch her as she sleeps
It's then I see her soul truly weep
You can tell by the way in which she moves
She has seen more than her fair share of abuse

She is always curled into the tightest ball
Arms covering her head, waiting for the fall
To many times awoken with angry fist
This is the way her body was always kissed
Cries of No echoing, disturb her silent night
As in her dreams, again she puts up a fight

The morning sun brings no sign of relief
Staggering under the weight of all the grief
Some days she can hide it all so well
Cheery voice, plastered smile no one can tell
But most days it only thunders, only storms
As emotions ripp through her like razor thorns

She whispers when she thinks no one can hear
"I'm so tired of feeling like this for so many years
Way beneath the surface... a lot more agony no one can see
Like an iceberg lost and floating, that is me"

I gently touch and wake her up, masking what's within my eyes
Yes, I wear my own disguise
Her beautiful essence hypnotized as it taunts
I'm scared of these feelings I don't want

Terrified one day she will just disappear
Falling forever through her darkened atmosphere
I don't know what to do, her eyes desperately pleads, "don't give up"
I fear I'm not even close to good enough
But she already tied my heart to hers with diamond tread
So I'll hold this bleeding angel that graces my bed
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