The Memoir Of Ms. Butterfly

It Should Have Been Me

I watch you step into your afterlife,
the happiness we once dreamed of in tandem.
And I whisper my congratulations,
But my heart cracks beneath the weight of truth—
That it should have been me.

Time does not rewind,
No hands turn back the stubborn clock,
And yet, my mind does laps around the past,
tracing every step, every misstep,
wondering if love was ever mine to hold.

I see it now, the quiet unraveling—
The words I never said,
the fears I never named,
The walls I built were doors that should have been.
I gave you Wonder Woman,
But what I needed was just to be me—
flawed, afraid, needing.

If I could do it all alone,
Why did I promise forever?
Why did I stand beside you
only to let the words I wielded like knives
Cut us apart?

Now, the ink is dry, the papers signed,
And I am left learning the most brutal truth:
That hurt does not justify hurting,
that love cannot be forced backward,
That your heart has long ceased being mine.

But still—
It should have been me.

Ms. Butterfly Genesis