Bait of kindness

Bait of kindness

When safety is a mask.

The heaviest silence is the one we were told to keep—the moments when innocence was met with manipulation instead of care.

It felt like a dream

something hard struggling to enter her

like a chunk of wood forcing

through the eye of a needle.

“Ouch!” she cried, in pain and fear.

Her confider became her convictor,

turning her ocean into a storm of pain.

At first, she was lost

then slowly, she was groomed,

until he became her shadow,

her so-called better half.

She sought his attention,

believing in illusions she could never see.

Now every kindness feels like bait for a trap,

and memory

a splinter she can never pull out,

leaving only the echo

of the girl she used to be.