DAY 8 || LOVE OR HOW NOT TO

Who taught you how to love

or how not to love

With every unconscious action they took

The men they settled for

The types they continually chose

Similar to those you love

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love

Her whispered screams from your father's drumline

the rhythm she endured every other night

Have made your lovers beats and hits

an acceptable way of life

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love

Constantly telling you that the man

Is the head of the home

While your mother stayed up

Catering to everyone except herself

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
Assuring you that it's okay to love them
more than you love yourself
suppressing who you really are
just so he stays with you

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
the father that was never there
or that never did love you
you continually search for
in the beds of older men

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
Weeping inside every time he climbs you
you could never decline
you have heard them say
a woman's body always belongs to her man

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
they told you it wasn't possible
for a man to be faithful
so you share him with other women
and treat his STDs

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
You were your mother's last hope
that's why she had you
she spent her youth
aborting pregnancy for men,
just like you have, twice now

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
they made you rush
a woman is nothing without a man
now you lay in different rooms every night
while hearing different women
scream and moan in your matrimonial bed
but you can't go back home

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
he beats you every night and
speaks negative words to your life
but you still can't leave
afterall your mother
never left your dad
she endured it all

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
that made you start to feel
that you weren't better than the hens
and that you had to be pregnant
every season
because he doesn't like to use protection
and you don't want to loose him

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
You invested too much and
been with him too long,
an expired good,
no one would love you again
so you hang out in the shadow
and corridor of a man
who will never commit.

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
who whispered doubts in you
and made you feel that losing him
is the same as losing yourself

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
they didn't remember to tell you
to love yourself first
and set your own rules
And your standards too

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
they didn't add the most essential gift
to your bridal carriage
they left behind, the most important lessons
like the fact that your choices are yours,
and your body as well.
that you matter, and you are valuable.

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
they forgot to scream that
your home would always be open
for when you stop feeling safe
and though your mother endured
you shouldn't have to

Who taught you how to love

Or how not to love
they forgot who taught them how to love
because all they know about love
 is all they had seen themselves
their great-grand mothers endured,
their grand mothers were silent,
their mothers settled,
but the next generation of women,
their daughters,
should never go through these paths again
without truly learning how to love!!