Betrayal Poem by Herbert Nehrlich

At last, I think I understand,
your silence is not indifference
nor could it be a covert message
of a dislike, born out of disappointment.

No, nothing as mundane as that.
You have now relegated me
to that forsaken place outside
of all our worlds, onto a scrapheap.

What little history we had, you did condense
and squeeze it with the energy of anger
though not quite indignation, too noble, that.
You have abandoned me for reasons of your own..

They say that leaving is akin perhaps to dying,
for whom I wonder, surely not for both.
But when I left you it was not a little death,
no, my departure cut much deeper, 'twas betrayal.