The barbs of your tongue

Cut me to shreds

Unpicking my mind's 

Most delicate threads 

 

So I weaved myself words

From the pit of my soul 

To replace all the light

And the joy you had stole

 

Then I ripped myself free

From your talons of spite

Spilling ink upon page

Under dawn's weary light

 

And I bled, intravenous 

Through roots of my mind 

Feeding a garden

Withered by time

 

But slowly it grew

Wonderful roses of words

And foliage of stanzas

And stories unheard 

 

And I, myself, grew

Into the man I should be

As the power of words

Both destroyed 

                          & saved me