When a Storm Brews Silence

Tight-lipped with nothing to say
It is the sternness of your words that have ate up my own.
It is with certainty that your rage billows like a storm at sea surrounding me.
Are you done?
Or are you finished?
The torment is enough, you have shut me up and spoken for the both of us.
My mind, my words, what I feel or think
Is not worthy of mention, but apparently yours is… more so than mine.
You yell and I clench my fingers into my palms.
I should walk away.
Would you follow me or yell louder until distance drowns out the spiteful commentary?
My feet won’t move.
I wiggle my toes
Shift from foot to foot.
You pause to take a breath.
“Aren’t you going to say something?!”
Me?
Now you want me to speak.
I stare at you.
Chest rising and falling quickly.
Look at all the energy dispelling from your body.
Warmth spreads into my feet and I turn away from you and walk.
Step by step, each one farther away.
It’s quiet behind me.
I glance back at you to a look of bewilderment and defeat.
Tussle with irrationality, no, no, I could not.
Like punching the rain or kicking falling snow.
The storm has passed and I’m making it back to shore bruised
Degraded disrespected unheard
Made lesser than, humiliated
Nonetheless I survived.
I am to be heard
I will not stick around and let another steal my humanity.