You Know Who You Are Getting Into Bed With
Read more poetry by Britt Wolfe
You don’t get to claim surprise.
Not now.
Not after the smoke.
You knew the temperature of that room.
The volatility.
The way sanity thinned
the longer you stayed.
You knew who you were aligning with—
the ones who smile like contracts
and speak like loopholes.
The ones who don’t build,
only extract.
Something was taken.
Not misplaced.
Not misunderstood.
Taken—
with intention,
with appetite,
with the quiet confidence of people
who believe consequence is for other lives.
And you stood there,
watching the math work itself out,
mistaking mutual assured destruction
for protection.
But here is the truth you keep avoiding:
their deal is not symmetrical.
Because when she burns,
she does not fall alone—
she drags the world with her
just to feel the heat obey her.
She does not fear ruin.
She romanticizes it.
Power, to her,
has never been about survival—
it has been about control.
About ruling something,
anything,
even if all that’s left
is ash clinging to her hands.
She would crown herself queen
of the wreckage,
declare victory over silence,
and call it legacy.
Even if she is ash too.
Especially then.
You think proximity saves you.
That loyalty will be rewarded.
That standing close enough to the fire
means it won’t touch you.
But fire does not make exceptions
for accomplices.
And when the reckoning comes—
not if,
when—
there will be no clean exits.
No plausible distance.
No version where you are untouched
by what you helped sustain.
You knew who you were getting into bed with.
You knew the instability.
The hunger.
The willingness to scorch
anything that resisted ownership.
And still—
you climbed in,
closed your eyes,
and told yourself
the flames were someone else’s problem.
History does not forget that kind of choice.
Ash remembers everything.
Keep My Words Alive
If this poem has stayed with you, you can help keep my words alive or explore more of my work. Every bit of support helps carry the stories forward.
WHERE WORDS MEET MORNING LIGHT
BEGIN EACH DAY WITH SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL
Every morning at 11:11AM, I send a poem — sometimes soft, sometimes devastating, always true.
💚 Subscribe now to read and breathe and feel along with me 💚
Poetry Anthologies by Britt Wolfe:
