When you Say You Love Me

...what does it mean?

When you say you love me...

I see the words floating above
surrounded by cotton-like clouds
for a moment, I believe in love

and then they fall

annihilation certain without refrain
for movements of arms and eyes and words
so full of anger that drip with disdain

they cover the air 

like an inpenetrable sheet of polluting smog
they enter my lungs and eyes as i breathe
in a state of confusion I'm left in a fog

that confines me

to the spot upon which I stand
unable to move or float or fall
just waiting for the next demand

to pierce my heart

and force me to breathe
in the toxic remains of seething rage
that paralyze me unable to leave

When you say you love me...

I shudder to think
what destruction would come
were you on the brink

of hating me.

 

 

 

Reviews

[Ken Simm.]

It has become a truism to say that the line between love and hate, as the line between sanity and not, is very thin ans elastic. Yet in another sense there is a world of difference. some things are never meant to be defined and yet we strain for ever to do just that.
This is not love, this is a selfish wish to posess. This that he speaks. That is why she feels choked and constricted. When he says he loves her he is really saying he wants her.
This is a very visual poem in that I can see the words drawn out and changing colour as they are spoken. This poem should be acted as it is written. I feel this is a collage of thoughts of a poem.

[Michael Kerr]

why do people have to bare this pain. i was i was the only one who had to feel this. for i know too well of this pain.

-mike kerr-

[Dave "Doc" Rogers]

This was an interesting piece. Using a 3 line stanza and rhyming around the middle line. Interesting. Visually this had nice appeal going for it too. 1:3:1 format throughout. Definitiely an emotional journey starting at one swing of the pendulum, love, and going to the other, hate.

Thanks for putting this out here.

Doc.

[Courtney]

wow. this one's going in the library.

[Richard McLin]

That was a very powerful piece of work, one that I think will stick with the reader long after they have read it, I know it will with me. Great work, some of your best. I know I have been gone for a while, but it's work like this that brought me back. Nicely done.


Richard.

[The Autumn Faerie]

I shudder, too, as I have been there...
The ever fine lines between love and hate...
It's almost cruel...

[poddar kushal]

mind is a chamelion...changes colors...it blurs line, so thin between reverse feelings

[Jet Lag]

your words are like a painting... they reveal so much and have beauty in form.

[PoemRodent]

Interesting write and mental imagery. Well done and very well penned.

[Ladysue]

You have captured this dynamic of a dysfunctional relationship with such perfect insight. Like Ken says, this is not love. It is a person who is very selfish and needs to control, and posses that it does leave the abused feeling choked, stifled and constricted. A powerful piece The rise and fall of emotion in here is greatly enhanced by the imagery and is picture perfect to what is being said. This is an individual who is highly insecure, selfish and doesn't know any other way to love. He has only experienced hate, control, and possessiveness. Outstanding insight and piece!!!

[Nicholas Hallows]

I like how you set this up as a typical love poem in the first stanza but then quickly turn it around in the next. Like Orlando said there is a sadness in the wistfulness of the first stanza longing for the love they imagine but then falling back to reality with the words. I really do think for some people those three words are just words too often said without true meaning. The single lines also add emphasis to this toxic relationship. Nice! NH