What You Didn'T Have To Do, Melody Sue Poem by DAVID TERRY

You did not have to destroy me to get what you wanted
It wasn’t necessary to transfer your blame, your shame, your game
To me to justify what you wanted to do
If you
Changed your mind, in line, in time
You could have just said so
Then chose to go
I’m an adult, I can take it
Yes it hurts, I wouldn’t fake it
But I can take the hurt and the heartbreak
I’m big enough to find a new life to make
Instead you had to transfer your pain
Instead you had to attempt to gain
Some petty advantage, some sick twisted goal
And wreck my own heart on your rocky life’s shoals
You could have just walked away
And chose to stay
With him to play
Your cheating games of lust
That cost all trust
Instead you berated, deflated, obliviated me
You transferred your hurt and injected your hate into me
I’m not innocent, this I well know
There is much about life and love in which I need to grow
I hurt you too, in the past, hurt that lasts
When you wanted me I would not move
And always I couched this in undeniable love
It was selfishness on my part, selfishness from a wounded heart
And yet when you wanted proof of intention
I gave what you asked for without intervention
Then you ran away with your new cheating lover
Without even telling me how now we were over
All throughout you played controlling games
Leading me on, letting me believe you felt the same
You didn’t have to lead me on
When you were gone
Done with us, through with us
You didn’t even say because
You didn’t have to lie about love
Saying you felt for me something above
Why did you lie just the night before
Your getaway on the stormy gulf shore
Saying you wanted and loved me and only me
And then spent the weekend writhing with ‘He’
Why did you lie?
Why did you say, only a few days before
How you wanted to marry me and be mine evermore?
Why did we talk about wedding plans, future plans?
Why did you make me think it could happen?
Why did you try to hold me on edge?
You didn’t have to rip and tear
Leaving my feelings bare
You didn’t have to play my emotions
Taking away devotion
In your doing these things I now believe
That over me you didn’t grieve
You could have said “I want someone new”
Not you, not you anymore
Nor evermore
You could have said you wanted to love him, hold him, make him yours
For chills, spills to ride his Latin thrill
From his unfaithful bed in Homestead
If you wanted away from me
Why didn’t you say so, you see?
Yes it would hurt, yes I would cry
But for your happiness I would try
Anything
Anything for you
I would have walked the walk
Balked but talked and gone away
From you today
If you had not lied and deceived and tried
To make me think your alibis
Were my fault, my responsibility
You didn’t have to demean my ability
To love you so fully
And what was really true
Quite real, what you made me feel
But that’s what you did from your soul unkind
Wrecked my heart and mind
Leaving my crying, hurting, flailing in the blind
To have your newest unfaithful affair
You didn’t have to tell me you never cared
And I now don’t know what was true or why me you hunted
Since you didn’t have to destroy me to get what you wanted