I Refuse To Thank Him For Resilience

I will not thank him for resilience.
He didn’t give me strength.
He gave me terror.
He gave me silence
where I once had music.
He gave me the kind of fear
that grows roots
behind your ribs
and wraps itself around
every good thing that tries to grow.

What didn’t kill me
left me half-alive.
I don’t sleep through the night.
I check the locks.
I don’t answer unknown numbers.
I jump when someone says my name too loud.
I map every room
for exits.
Call that survival
if you want.
But don’t call it strength.

He didn’t break me open—
he broke me down.
And I am still crawling
through the wreckage
he left behind.
There are places in me
that will never heal smooth.
There are versions of me
I will never get back.

And still,
people ask me
if I’m grateful.
If the fire made me brighter.
If the trauma made me wiser.
If the scars
are proof
that I’m lucky to be here.

No.
No.
I was always meant to be here.
He didn’t give me anything
but grief.
He didn’t sharpen me.
He dulled me.
He didn’t shape me.
He shattered me.
And I,
with blood in my teeth
and no one watching,
had to learn
how to rise from rubble.

There is no glory
in the survival
he forced me into.
There is only breath.
And breath,
some days,
is hard enough.

So no.
I will not thank him.
Not for this body
stitched in places no one sees.
Not for the years I lost
to flinching.
Not for the way
my trust now comes
like rain in drought—
scarce,
thin,
and always late.

He did not make me strong.
He made me wounded.
And I made myself
still here.

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