Read more poetry by Britt Wolfe
There are loves
that do not know
where they end
and another begins.
They grow together,
root beneath root,
until devotion becomes allegiance,
and allegiance
is mistaken for truth.
And somewhere
in the quiet architecture
of belonging,
a door is closed
without anyone remembering
who turned the key.
There is a particular sorrow
in being loved
only in the absence
of another's influence.
In knowing tenderness
was possible,
that it lived and breathed
in ordinary moments,
that it could be reached
when nothing stood between.
And still,
it could not stay.
How many times
can a truth be offered
before its offering
becomes a wound?
How many gentler words
might have changed the ending?
How much silence,
how much surrender,
how much of a soul
must be made smaller
to be permitted
a place at the table?
Perhaps there was a way.
Perhaps there wasn't.
Perhaps the tragedy
was never in the words,
but in the invisible loyalties
that decided
which voices mattered
before anyone spoke.
And what a terrible thing,
to spend a lifetime
searching for a reason
inside a heart
that could not explain itself.
The world is full
of borrowed certainties,
of love confused with obedience,
of wounds inherited
without anyone knowing
who first began to bleed.
And when the answers
do not come,
there is always talk of God,
of mysterious ways,
of purposes too profound
for mortal understanding.
But perhaps
there is no hidden wisdom.
Perhaps some things
happen without a reason
worthy of the suffering
they leave behind.
And perhaps peace
is not the moment
everything makes sense,
but the moment
the questions
are finally allowed
to remain unanswered.
Not every knot
can be untied.
Not every love
can be separated
from the loyalties
that strangled it.
And not every ending
is an understanding.
Sometimes,
it is only the gentle
and unbearable acceptance
that something beautiful
was there,
that something else
stood between,
and that nothing
can be asked of it
anymore.
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Poetry by Britt Wolfe:
What happens when love becomes allegiance, loyalty is mistaken for truth, and the people we cherish become strangers beneath the weight of all of it? Emotional Enmeshment is a deeply intimate exploration of invisible family loyalties, the heartbreak of conditional tenderness, and the exhausting search for answers that may never exist. It is a poem about the relationships that might have been, the love that was undeniably real, and the quiet devastation of accepting that some things cannot be repaired, explained, or understood. For anyone who has ever wondered whether different words, greater patience, or a little more love might have changed everything—and is learning to make peace with never knowing.💚