I Give You Back to Yourself

Because I love you,
I give you back to yourself.

Under your adamant desire
to take the world on alone,
is a part of you crying, 'Save me,
I will fail if I am left on my own.'

I always come to you running,
When I feel your vulnerable pain.
And as part of you pushes me back,
Another part is glad I came.

But because I love you,
I give you back to yourself.

You give me the control,
Of the life that belongs to you.
Asking me to forge your haven,
An anchor to pull you through.

Blindly I accepted,
What is the most precious gift,
Ignoring too readily,
the balance of power as it shifts.

Now because I love you,
I give you back to yourself.

It is a paradox, Love,
and burden we are not meant to bear.
You belong solely to yourself,
except for what you choose to share.

Your future is authored,
by the ink of your own design.
Your strength to weather the storm,
is in your own determined shaking.

So because I love you,
I give you back to yourself.

I am cannot be a shield
To defend you from self-harm,
I cannot undue the blood,
You call forth, dripping from your arm.

I must give you back,
Your burden I tried to bear.
In my need to protect you,
I took more than my share.

Thus because I love you,
I give you back to yourself.

I can walk beside your road,
Giving you my clasped hand.
But lies with you is the weight,
to be willing to stand.

I cannot keep trying to commit you,
To chooses that are your own.
Without becoming the demon,
For which I cannot atone.

With deepest apology for my arrogance,
I give you back to yourself,
because I love you.