sunsets after dark. | poetry collection

331. + A.N.

331.
Maybe then she'll need me.
As I watch my mother leave through the double doors of the daycare center.
I have realized that I have been left to be someone else's problem.
Knowing she had the day off from work she left me anyway.
She didn't need me.
So she left.
I cried and cried waiting for my mother.
Since maybe if I cried out and she heard me.
Maybe then she'll need me.

My heart was shattered.
Lying on the floor in millions of tiny pieces.
Being imbedded into my palm and pads of my fingers.
Knowing I had just gave my heart out again.
To someone who didn't need me.
Neither did they want me.
I picked up my pieces of my broken heart and left.
Maybe if they saw how my absence affected them.
Maybe then they'll need me.

I gave my heart out again.
Never learning my lesson.
I tried to heal wounds I didn't cause.
Taking the burden of more than I could chew.
I thought if I was better at it he would need me.
If I was a better healer.
A better caregiver.
A better person.
A better someone.
Maybe then he'll need me.

None of them needed me.
Neither she, them, nor he.
They didn't need me.
I thought if they needed me I would be loved.
It would make my heart swell.
Make me feel warm and better about myself.
If someone, anyone needed me.
But not for who I was.
For what I could give.
~E, you do not need to be needed to be loved.

•••
This poem is a little different than longer ones I have written before. But after balling in the therapist office a few hours. Here's what I took from it.

YOU DO NOT NEED TO BE NEEDED TO BE LOVED!

Your friends, girlfriend, boyfriend, or partner or whoever you associate yourself with should want to be around you for who you are and not what you can give them. Rather that it be physical or mental even emotional.
They should want to be around you anyway because of who you are as a person and not what you could give them.