I AM NOT AN APOLOGY

Some of us survive by accident. In I Am Not an Apology, Aaron de Monbrun writes from the edge of collapse - where ego fractures, love misfires, and identity is stripped down to bone. These poems trace the architecture of emotional self-destruction: unrequited longing, addiction disguised as devotion, intensity mistaken for worth. They move through shame, performance, desire, and the quiet violence of trying to be chosen. But beneath the wreckage, something remains. Not redemption. Not resolution. Presence. This is the origin story of a man who refuses to shrink - even when shrinking would have been easier. A man who learns that being "too much" was never the flaw. The flaw was apologizing for it.