On Anger and Honesty

These are your options:


Be demur and dishonest.
Flutter your eyelashes and lie, lie, lie.
Tell them everything they want to hear,
bless their hearts.
Let them get away with murder.
Cover your gaping wounds and go home to flatline in private.

Be reasonable and resilient.
Don’t let them off the hook so easily--
It takes two to tango
and you never dance alone.
Keep smiling, but let them see the sharp edge.
Make sure they know you forgive, but you’ll survive by remembering.

Be furious and fatal.
You will not take the fall for this.
Spit poison barbs without remorse
and carve into their excuses,
your knife dripping hot with blame like blood.
Leave them motionless on the floor and don’t look back.

Some say the first option is weak
and the third inhumane.
Clearly only the middle is safe ground on which to stand.
But I say you cannot blame a snarling animal
for lashing out when it’s cornered,
nor a broken heart for smashing everything else.