Your Pitiful Reflection

Can't you show me a little respect?
Try a bit harder, think a bit faster!
Why won't you reply when I write?
Pick up when I call?
Why can't you spare a minute to say hi,
not just when you feel like it?

I am tired of your disrespect.
Please consider my feelings for once,
because they are not like yours.
I am a person just like you,
staring back on the wrong side of our love-hate relationship.

Won't you be a little nicer?
Think before you speak, stop before you judge.
Am I so despicable, that you won't even let me be the person I am meant to be?

I just want you to treat me
like you would anyone else.
Stop putting me down, writing me off,
laughing at your perceived "immaturity".

There is no one more naive than you.
You, who have never known genuine kindness,
sincere laughter, warmest of smiles.
I am your prey because I offered you all of that and more.

Are you running from me, or are you running from the demon within you?

Are you angry at me, or at the reflection through my eyes?
A helpless little boy lost in the maze of his own heart,
shivering in fear.

Stop projecting onto me!
I am not your inflatable punch bag.
I am not your decades-old doormat.
You are never as pitiful as you think you are.
You are no better than a whining brat who is too lazy to reach for the stars.

When will you wake up from your self pity,
and see the truth behind your binding negativity?
I am but dull physical flesh,
offering a feathered reflection that no one else can.

Look into the mirror and seek yourself.
Ask yourself why I am now leaving you?
I cannot be your mirror forevermore.
You have shattered me with your inability to love, and your pleasure to scorn.

At the receiving end of your unending self-hatred,
who should I pity more,

You, or myself?