Sammi Brown—

It’s more than just the name that I wear.
I am more than the pain that I’ve bared.
I’m more than how I’m perceived,
more than my environment
and the thoughts within me.

I’m more than what I’ve been told.
I won’t be me until the day I grow old,
and even then, my job won’t be done.

I’m interchanging.
I’ll be growing until the day
I can’t feel the sun-
or breathe the air.

I’m 18,
and I bet I’ve been there,
seen it,
and done it.

I came from broken homes
where I was unloved and unwanted,
where vulnerability was seen
as a way to make profit.

Socially.
Emotionally.
Physically.
They always found a way to come up off it.

A victim of my environment,
but I’m more than just a product.
Trust was the cost of all the lies that I bought.
I was saving face for the love
they said they had got.

But the love was fake—
not worth the cost.

And now,
I’m unlearning love.

The inconsistent,
"I-have-to-love-you-from-a-distance"
kind of love.

The attachment that has me
bending over backwards
kind of love.

The "maybe-it’s-the-way-I-acted"
kind of love.

The "I could-never-hit-them-back"
kind of love.

I’m unlearning
the thought that I have to change—
the way I act,
this and that—
to be loved.

I’m unlearning love.

And that’s why I wrote Unlearning Love.
Because my life was only pain
when it wasn’t concerning by love—
just materialistic things
and the fear of opening up.

I never thought it would change
until I started discerning love.

I founded F.T.L.O.P Publishing
in hopes of spreading the lessons
I learned from love.

For the love of poetry.
For the love of publishing
the topics kept hush—
from systemic leverage
to emotions bottled up.

It all has a place on these pages,
and it’s written down with love.