“To hate is an easy, lazy thing—but to love takes strength everyone has, but not all are willing to practice” ~ Rupi Kaur

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I used to find comfort in my love for you, but now these lingering feelings are causing me to hate that I ever let you into my heart in the first place.

I’m not sure I even had a choice in the matter—somehow you found a way in, even though I kept my doors locked tight against a man such as yourself.

Men like you have the ability to make a woman forget that she needs to protect her heart.

And baby, I have tried—but yet, each time, all it would take is one touch to remind me that some people really are worth having a little bit of chaos over.

We both know that I don’t truly hate you, simply because you are an amazing soul, and while I am thankful for all of our time together—I do wish my love would fade as effortlessly as you have from my life.

Even though you are no longer here, your ghost still lingers in my dreams—recollecting the trembling passion that would erupt between your fingertips and my skin.

I do love you, but once you left this space, I simply didn’t know what to do with all of this love.

The truth is that I don’t think you ever really knew what to do with my love, as it seemed you always printed “return to sender” in your melodic way and sent it back to me.

Yet somehow, each time you appeared on my doorstep—in search of a way to help you figure out what you were feeling—all I had to offer was my ripe and bleeding heart. But it always seemed just a little too raw for you.

Perhaps it was too real, or maybe it was just too damn overwhelming to think that you could be loved in such a way.

The hate I had wasn’t for you—it wasn’t even for the fact that you will forever own acreage in my heart—but rather, it’s because you were unable to accept what I offered.

It took me a long time to figure out what I was feeling, and it seems once I finally did, it was too late—because life had taken you in a different direction.

So I held onto that love, and I tried to keep it a secret by covering it in fears and sarcasm, because I was embarrassed to show you just how much you meant to me.

I tried to be a woman I wasn’t, but even my flimsy chiffon of carefree attitude couldn’t fully mask all that I felt for you.

And like most truths, it eventually came bubbling to the surface, until the only thing that was left to do was the one thing that I had never done—to tell you exactly how I feel about you.

When I first started rolling over the idea of telling you, “I love you,” it wasn’t bitter as I’d expected—but sweet, as it melted against the warmth of my heart.

I realized that even if you wouldn’t allow yourself to care for me in the same way—even if we couldn’t be together—none of those reasons made my love for you any less valuable.

I personally believe that we owe it to those we are care about to tell them precisely how we feel, simply because love isn’t something to be embarrassed over—it’s something to be cherished.

So I finally told you every last detail in my heart.

How I do love you and how I don’t want any other man to be the one who has his hands on my body—how I could actually see you in my life.

Instead of hate though, all I felt was more love.

Because by holding onto my love like a prisoner, I was actually hurting myself—so once I released it into the world and placed it into the palm of your hand, I was free.

I was honoring myself and who I am—no longer self-conscious because I had caught feelings, but instead proud that my heart had fallen in love with a man like you.

I didn’t expect you to say anything, because I know that it’s currently an impossible situation—one that in many ways makes me respect you even more.

Yet, once I let my love flow freely to you, the hate started to seep away as well.

And of course, while I did wish to hear those same words from your beautiful lips, I no longer needed it to find peace.

The only thing that I had to do to find solace was to love you exactly as you are in this moment.

To love you for the reality of the situation and the impossibilities that feel like barbed wire at times marking the boundaries of space between you and me.

To just simply love you was the only thing I needed to do.

If I am being honest—it’s easier to say I hate that I love you, rather than I hate that it didn’t work out for us.

But I’ve accepted that life is what we make of it, and while I can’t control your choices, I can control my own.

Even though I love you, I am moving forward.

I don’t know if a new man will be able to capture my heart like you did, nor do I know if he will replace your spot in my heart or if it will just grow to accommodate his new love.

Regardless of any of that, I’ve accepted that this isn’t our time—and maybe it won’t ever be.

So I’m dating and living my life with you still in my heart.

I don’t hate that I love you anymore, because I’ve realized that my love for you has made me a better woman.

I want to hold onto that and turn it back toward my own wild and free heart, because in the end—love is just love, and it’s too beautiful a thing to hold tightly to.

Because whether you love me or not, it won’t ever change the fact that I do love you—and there is no room for hate once we have accepted that truth.

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Author: Kate Rose

Editor: Yoli Ramazzina

Photo: Pixabay