Architecture Of Anger

Anger is a cage, but who is the prisoner?
Steel fortress shuns all visitors
Once you're in, you don't come out
If you're out, you won't ever make it in
The drawbridge is electrified
The walls are superconductive
The moat flows thick with sulfuric acid
Inside the fortress lies three men, guarding a secret
One is the architect
The other a maintenance man
The third a warden
Deep below the vaults lie a beast
The beast has not stopped howling for decades
Beaten, enslaved, depraved
It does not understand why it is there
It is hideous in form, unrelenting and volatile
It has destroyed the underbelly where a brilliant palace once stood
It destroyed every iteration of the palace several times
The warden wants it dead, but knows it is too strong
He locks it down and watches it, knowing it will kill if free
The maintenance man wants only to remain busily neutral
So long as his life can continue as it is
The architect is fascinated by it and quietly understands it
Even more so quietly, he empathizes with it
For years this has gone on
If only they knew that they were all parts of the same person
The architect
The worker
The warden
The beast
All are the prisoner in the cage of anger
All are the same person
That person is me
For so many years I have watched myself become consumed
I don't forgive. I don't forget. I don't let go.
Of anything.
Once you wrong me, you've wronged me forever
You mistrusted me once, doubted me once, questioned me once
I never live it down
I punish you forever
I punish myself tenfold
I understand your every fear
You were completely rational to doubt me and to question me
No human is perfect, especially not I
Yet I hold myself to such a standard, and you as well
That I cannot seem to let go of what you did to me
Nay, even more, I cannot seem to let go of what I did to you
I keep asking myself why you questioned, doubted, feared, mistrusted
I probe and probe until I become the problem
I drill and drill until I hate myself
Until I kill myself inside
Until I believe you want to kill me too
Anger is the cage
I am the beast
I am the worker
I am the warden
I am the architect
I am the prisoner
I don't know how to break free
But it's time I started trying