Respect Denied Presence Removed

A fine silt has covered my heart
gravity has dealt us hence.

You have chosen your paths,
and I mine.

I don't wish to know you anymore.

I cast you from my sight.

That peripheral irritation too constant to bear.

This is how you manipulate.
Staying just outside of clear eye line
and reaching distance
but still making your presence known all the same.

A small gnat giving way to multiples and divisions of a personality
I thought I knew once.

And I wished you could have been more direct.
Paused, or just lighted long enough on a still point
for me to have snatched you into non-existence.

But that has never been your style.
A world shrouded in dark fantasies
with the perversion of optimism to carry your through
to illogical
and violent endings for those
more privy to be driven mad by your
endless passive agression.

You have become your own self-fulfilling prophecy this time.

And so I will look to you no longer.
Be vexed by your withdrawal and sudden insertions no more.

Be free of it.

Know there is peace in this passing.
Stop strangling the ghost of drowned horses.

I grow tired of these silly adolescent games.
Have no more patience for these feeble attempts
for self gratifying attention seeking behaviors.

You said it yourself.

"I
Am
Instituting
An
Immediate
No
Contact
Policy."

Well the standards double and quadruple.

As usual.

So I guess I will still have to be the one
that takes to higher grounds, or roads as it were.

I will have to continue to model
adult behaviors
and healthy boundaries
and space
and insulation
and silence
for myself as much as for you.

I don't think I've ever hidden so many lines
in the sand before now-
hairpin detonation wires humming beneath the surface.
But what your push pull sway represents
even on a subconscious level
is dangerous and foolish.

Silly little girl,
I am done to death with you.

No longer wish to have you as a friend
or companion
in ANY
respect
since I cannot expect that respect in kind.

So enjoy this
freedom
this indifference
this shoulder
turned cold with love's mortal coil exhausted.

Know it's out of self and mutual respect
that I banish thee
to memory and nothing more.

And soon even the pang of nostalgia
will bear no heat of burn
for I will have calloused over by then
to your ceaseless needling.

And you
cannot look to me
any longer
for anything other
than laughter
sounding ruckus at your willowy backbone.

Three Locks

"I have six locks on my door all in a row. When I go out, I lock every other one. I figure no matter how long somebody stands there picking the locks, they are always locking three." - Elayne Boosler

These days when I leave my house
I place my heart in a glass bowl on my coffee table.
It is not that I don't like to take it out into the world with me
It is just that when you wear yours like I do
strapped to my chest like a bullet proof vest
you discover quickly it is messy
and easily broken.

And I can think of a thousand other scraps
of bone, tissue, and organs
more valuable to give to those I love
than this pulpy mass
of perforated tissue.

I never stopped learning to play the part of the hero
Stared down an army of girls toting Tommy guns
in stilettos
just to say that I loved them and survived it.
A little wiser for the way the wind
has made a whistle of my chest.

But I've learned that my heart is an organ
built to circulate
and not stay still
and it is always pulling me in oppositional directions.

Learned through trails and errors
about its puppeteer ways
how it pulls me about by marionette veins.
A ventriloquist hidden behind the stage rafters of my ribs
and velvet curtains of my breasts.

In the safety of my locked apartment it waits each day
until I come home
and tell it stories of the million times or more
it might have fallen in love with everything and everyone
it sees.

And I am aware that some day
I will come through that door
and a woman will be waiting for me
a stiff martini in one hand
and my last pack of cigarettes in the other.

She will crush them
telling me I was a fool
to think of poisoning something
so beautiful and carefree.

And since I don't have my heart with me
to set it free
like a carrier pigeon and send her word that I am coming
I will use my tongue instead,
a collection of muscles stronger than my heart
to conjure her into existence.

She will love me fragile fierce
and tender tenacious.
And her entire body will be a poem
that I will never be clever enough to capture.

She will use those her hands to
hold me upright when I am shaky
and feel like my chest wall is a mine shaft
caving into its own darkness.

She will wrap palms full of desire around my waist while we
dance,
laugh too loudly - a sonar signal for me to find my way to her in a crowded bar,
cling to my jaw with her fingerprints when she kisses me,
Grip my body with strength and admiration
to bend my knees to my shoulders while I bring her children
scream mewling into this world.

She will understand the panic pain I feel when my parents
have become collections of ash and memento adorning my temple walls.
She will know how to touch me and make my body a
cathedral built of sound and gooseflesh.
She will worship rivers for their wisdom
always leading to an ocean somewhere
a wild place
bucking and swaying
against everything hard that tries to keep her
landlocked.

She will know the value of the home we have built together
never to stray too far away without being able to find her way back to me.
She will think twice about locked doors
and how multiples of three are sacred truths to me.
So when I come home that day
to three locks loaded like a gun
ready to fire all blanks built of bravado in my face-

And she is waiting for me
I will not be surprised
at the smell of gun powder
singing in her hair
or the lock picks
dangling from her wrists.

I will know then
that hearts are not for keeping
but for giving away
as mine beats a rhythm
sounding the click and slide
of each tumbler bowing
for her entrance.

Missing Pieces

There are moments yes
when I miss you still.
Three weeks have passed now
and I have cried less than I thought I would
but more violently than I had expected
in those quiet times
when I have been able to let my guard down
and release the sadness.

There are tender pieces
which will and have gone missing
since you left.
Pieces only for you.
And I will feel greater someday for another kind of woman,
but this way, I will not love quite the same again the way I did you.

It is an attribute to your singularity.
All your quirks and flaws and virtues
painting layer upon layer
to flesh out a girl
I thought could be the woman of my dreams one day
if only we could have both been patient
or better suited for each other
or different.
But we're not, and actually I am coming to embrace that
as the best thing about this relationship.

I can at least say on my behalf,
I blossomed into myself
through growth and determination.


There is indifference
and frustration
and rejection to carry me through the worst of it.
And they are small but temporary mercies.

There is still care,
still concern, and regard and affection for you here
hidden in the webbing of my bone marrow.

After three and a half years,
there is a lot to disentangle
to allow me to be completely free of you.
I am aware of this.
I still haven't been able to go through all of my things
to find yours to give back to you.

It is not that I don't want to.
I actually want to, give you back all these things
if only so that I don't have to look at them any longer.
Don't have to startle when I find something hidden by the bedside
or tucked away onto my bathroom shelf.

It is more out of the utility to exorcise this place,
my apartment,
of your presence than anything else.
I don't plan on keeping much of anything you ever gave me.
Eventually, I will take inventory in my storage locker
and when I come across all those letters and cards,
I'll probably burn them all.

I can't hold onto this anymore.
It's too much pain.
I hope you understand.
I'll treasure the memories
but the physical weight of your presence
is a yoke I have found too cumbersome to carry
anymore.

Mobile Thoughts

The piglet has started walking all on her own.
Not that you'd care really...
I highly doubt this would register any response from you emotionally other than surprise at it finally happening and yet seeming so fast.

I'm starting to understand now what I think the problem was
in you investing time into relationships with my family.
I think the more you saw it, the more you became acutely aware
how important these people, and remaining close to them was to me.

That they were not people I was willing to just
extricate myself from to suit your dreams and whims alone.
There were other times in my life,
other relationships where I might have entertained that possibility.

With you, at this time,
it has never crossed my mind however.
I wouldn't have followed you that way
a sad puppy dog sniffing at your heel backs
forced to leave all I love behind
so that you could flit from location to location
until you found yourself.

And I find that now,
your reaction to my niece
and my spending time with her
has become all too clear.
It frightened you.
Showed you how I would have done anything
to have made room in my life so easily for her always,
showed the distance in emotional development between us,
showed you the unwavering certainty that I will someday be a mother
and I believe it lit on the fact that you realized you weren't done yet
growing up yourself enough to fully fathom that thought without the recoil of fear.

All the big talk for nothing
Why do you waste so much time lying to yourself?
To please others?
Obviously this - this is not pleasant for anyone.
And I keep coming back to these questions
this aching wound that refuses to heal
without ripping open each time I spend moments
with my friends or family:
Why would you string me along for 6 months?

Why would you come up with excuse after excuse to prolong the inevitable?
Why didn't you just let me end it the week before?
Is this all just a game for control to you?
Is that how you treated this time with me...
pulling your punches at the right time
so you could call the shots constantly?
And when can I get my life back?

Because for me, there is something extremely damaging
in the memories I have spent with you and the piglet
looking up and watching your eyes constrict with fear,
refusing to hold her,
to touch her at all really,
to know her in any other way than a silent
momentary figure there and gone again for weeks on end.

There's the same sense of damage in you
spinning me yarns about why you pulled away from me
physically, emotionally, sexually.
Blaming it on everything imaginable,
yet seemingly alright with letting it just waste
while not being able to let it go.

Why would you do that?
Just plain cowardice?
Is that all this really comes down to?
Or was it rather an honest desire for the opposite?
and yet enough of what you were getting or wanting was laid bare
for you to stay and pick the mines clean.

Did you really think this would have played out the way you wanted?
That if you spent enough time with me, convinced me you loved me enough,
that when you finally voiced these needs in opposition to mine
I would just give in and follow you blindly?
Did you think I would stop trying to be gratified as well?
Is this the only way you know how to function really?

Making sure you are provided for first,
before stopping to think of the bare minimum it might take
to keep the other person around?
Are you only giving after you've finished taking?
My heart wants to say that's not true,
but well...

You never did live up to the needs and wants I asked for
when we got back together with any kind of consistancy.
Instead, you turned me into a broken record of requests,
pleading, demands.
But what? Did you think I was going to shut up?

I wasn't asking you for anything you didn't ask for
in the first place.
You wanted me to have a relationship with your parents, your only family,
I did that. I invested in that, fully.
You never did the same with mine.

You said you wanted me to work on my communication style,
I did that, remained in constant check with me,
learned to voice my needs and wants differently,
learned to handle disputes differently too.
It wasn't always 100% corrected, but over time
the change was massive.

You on the other hand,
never did get the hang of communicating with me.
Always putting up walls and barriers
I would have to either be content to sit outside
or topple down to get you to speak to me.
And you would always have more waiting for me on the other side.

Control my sweet thing,
is an addiction.
Of this I have been abundantly aware.
So before you get cute,
and start convincing yourself that I was trying to control you
in this relationship
think twice about this.

The ability to communicate my needs and wants,
whether you gratified them or not,
but to be consistent in at least expressing them
is what separates me from being a loving partner
and a walking pushover.

In any case,
there's a kind of comfort
that I will no longer have to subject my niece to your
absentee ways.
Thankful that she is so young she will never remember you.
Thankful that she, as a child, something that needs nurturing energy and love and enthusiasm around her as she develops
will not have a mute statue for a second aunt.
Not like I could have ever called you that anyway
you were hardly present enough to hold up to the title.

And I wish
I could have spared myself the lesson as well
Watching you silently sent the message through your behavior
that "the opposite of love isn't hate, it's indifference."
as you are so fond of quoting.
But then again, you'd know a great deal about indifference
wouldn't you?

Shower

Tonight I let the steam of a hot shower its mistress.
Let loose the faucet handles and
bathed all my scars and scrapes and near misses
until they were scrubbed clean and raw.

Water has the remarkable ability to heal you
when you realize that its fluid first held you
neatly in the cupped softness of its palm.

This is no different
and I realize I always come back to water
when I require healing.
When I am sick
or racked with grief
or fragile
I return to the nearly suffocating kiss of water.

And maybe this
is why I enjoyed diving so much
the depths brought treasures and vistas unimaginable
to my land locked eyes
and what I saw there
was worth returning to
over and over
even if I knew I couldn't call it my home forever.

Life is no different
and I am learning quickly
that each time I am able to hold
the surface within my lungs for longer.
Bring it down with me
and show those depths others fear to
tread there was at least one soul out there
that wasn't afraid of what it had to offer,
but did respect its biting majesty made motion.

How I understood that tidal patterns and
changes in the current
might make it more challenging
to enjoy oneself,
but the discoveries that waited
were well worth the trouble.

There's a pearl waiting for me
somewhere out there
and I will sift through every square inch
of ocean until I find her.
And when I do, I will forge it into jewelry.
I will wear it like a beacon around my neck
and savor the absolute aphrodisiac of its flavors.
Knowing full well that water
has ability to heal me
when I realize that its fluid first held me
neatly in the cupped softness of its palm.

Free For All

Last night was electric
the kind of experience where I stretched outside my comfort zone
and coincidentally I found myself there.

Ordinarily in the past I would have sheltered myself.
Guarded up, stuck like a shadow to those I knew only,
not talked to people, not made new connections,
failed to make eye contact or really take in the experience.

Not so last night.
Last night was further proof that I am
and continue to
find myself everywhere I go
and reflect back that unique signature that makes up my soul
to the rest of the world no matter where I am.

I made new connections,
I flirted,
I danced,
and I remained present to everything.

And in that I found a kind of rush
that I can only describe as the joy of living.
Life is about having a collection of experiences
some non-sequitors we do not understand at first
but later, it dawns on us that this was part of a greater whole.

And this life I have
is so worth living fully
that I can't imagine going backwards
and becoming the recluse I was before.

And last night
there were moments where you popped into my head
but they were so fleeting
I didn't find them painful in the slightest.
Only serving as a series of reminders that
you were a person I still thought of
as I am wont to do with any number of people
that have come into my life
and then left it to brave their own trails.

I found an old vial of your perfume in my bag last night
when I was sifting through its contents to give someone my
contact information
and at first I had the inclination to throw it away.
Not so much out of a reflex to cast you out, but to let you go.
But I thought about it, for that brief moment and decided
that it didn't bother me sitting there, not demanding my attention
or desire.

It was just there.
A memory I could encounter and release
without the pain of feeling violated.
So why should I throw it away right in that moment
when it really wasn't bothering anyone?

And it wasn't about keeping it
to keep you with me.
You'll always have the space in my heart you occupied once
We do not excise these loves and dispel them unless they are
truly toxic.
And you weren't toxic so much as you were
an experiment gone haywire.

A chance to stretch my comfort zone
and find myself.
Which I have, and for that I am so grateful.
But in finding ourselves, I believe we are meant to move on.
And moving on is exactly what I am focused with right now.

So I want you to be well,
and I still want the space both of us need to heal properly.
But I do hope that someday, if it has not already happened for you
you can encounter my memory the same way
and just be at peace with it
the way I am with yours.

Whiplash

Last night
someone asked me where you were
I wanted to answer honestly
The thought that ran through my mind first
clear and present
"I don't know."

Instead I paused
and awkwardly answered
"No longer with me."
A simple truth
with complicated intonations.

Everyone says they are sorry...at first.
I am and I'm not.
I wasn't enjoying this any longer.
I was holding onto the memory of your core
when I knew you better.
It was what was allowing me
to keep seeing you through all the changes we both went through.
The outfit could change, more years gracing your face,
but I saw your smile clear and present in each moment and found a way
to marry the past with the present to birth a future in my mind's eye.
Can you fault me for that?

I find this space in time to look back on things clearly obnoxious though
the last six months of rejection after rejection
has left some rather stinging wounds in its wake.
And you keep rubbing salt in them anyway.
I hid you from my view, but you show up in the main feed anyway.
You show up when you talk to my friends.
And nothing you say has really upset me so far
aside from butting into my circle of friends.

Friends you have never really fostered anything beyond
slight acquaintance anyway.
I wonder why you keep holding onto them.
I wonder when you will move on.
I'm aware you could call me a hypocrite for doing the same
but there are some people I have in fact fostered some connections with
independent from you
that for the meantime I am content to keep up.
That connection to them, in reality has nothing to do with you.

But I have trouble understanding why you choose to contact the friends of mine
that you do. There's really nothing there for you anyway, and when you move on physically from this space, so will they, and you won't have much of anything to tie each other together.

Speaking of moving,
I am aware you're looking at grad school on the east coast.
I'm happy for you, I actually don't mourn that one bit.
There was a peace in that news I found settling.
Good, things are as they should be, we are free to
go our own ways.
I want you to go out and find more of yourself
so you have more to give to other people you meet.

But the Francis Sage poem I saw crawl into my main feed today
that was bullshit.
Forgive me being self centered but a break up poem like that
is that not supposed to represent how you feel about this situation?
And you are free to process in any way you choose.
But that, so publicly, and that specific poem.
What a callous slap in the face.

I didn't attach any illusions to you.
I didn't attach expectations that weren't warranted
only hopes I heard you mirror back to me at one point.
And I resent you for breathing that suggestion into existence
through spoken word...my own art form.

Like that wouldn't hurt me?
Are you really that naive?
Have you already forgotten who I am
and who I am meant to be that you would throw that
into my own face?

And the end of that piece
calling the antagonist shit?
Is that a knock against me or you?
I never called you shit.
I've actually never said you aren't capable of getting what you want
or going where you want to.
I just called it like it was.
I just tried to inject some real world reality into these dreams you had
not to stop you from pursuing them, even if that meant without me,
but rather so that you could truly achieve them.

I have never wanted to strip you away from what is truly you
or your own destiny.
You are you, I've been acutely aware of that
from the moment I met you.

And my mistake in this relationship
was one to try to help you see what I saw in you
so that you could embrace the life you wanted
no matter what that held for you.
You could do that on your own all along, and you have.
The second was to buy into sugary sweet promises
of forever, when the first things I wrote to you
were that we had some work to do for/with each other in the now
and then we should move on.

I was mistaken with the original application
saying I wasn't capable of love,
I know that now this is part of what you were meant to teach me.
But you're hanging a lot of weight on a dead horse
if you mean to pass off on me like I trapped you in this.

I never trapped you in this
I asked you to join me if you wanted to
after you lured me in.
And maybe that's all it was to you
a challenge you couldn't back away from
saw something in me remarkable enough to say
yes to for the moment and fall head over heels.
Perhaps that is what I did too in the end.

But I don't appreciate the backlash from you on this.
Especially when I tried to give you my best always, it wasn't
always perfect but it was me.
And you calling me delusional when I tried to break up with you
that, that is the heart of the problem.

Please stop projecting your issues onto me.
I obviously wasn't delusional if I told you I sensed you wanting to go
and wanted to have you go.
You were the one that kept saying you wanted to stay
until the static of your fantasy world
collided with the impossibility of your reality.

You were the one that was upset when I told you I had to rethink this
after you told me the direction you were headed in.
A direction you again, had kept secret from me, only delineating the meager outline
but never fleshing it out fully-
own up to the fact that you did that.

Please don't lay that on me while you listen to bitter spoken word poems.
Please don't expect me not to see that as a glaring "fuck you" to me.
And please don't mock the fact that yes, I need more time.
I am still hurting. I am healing, but I am still hurting.
And I find that after all the support and love and yes sacrifice
I have given to you over the years,
you acting like this is just selfish.

And the lines in there about how you would never come back
betray everything you have said to me thus far.
But they don't betray your actions, that's for damn sure.
I have never known you to be anything but a good sprinter when the chase
got too thick, when the time started running out on you, in an effort to be the first out the door and not the one left standing before an empty finish line.
So if you feel more comfortable being a coward, if that's how you function, I suppose you should continue.

I am only taking my time so the final parting doesn't have to be cliches
borne of high school and melodrama.
I'd like to be grown up about this.
I believe we taught each other that much.
But you ending it over the phone,
then identifying with a poem in which the person says
they would never come back
just epitomizes for me that you would rather run headlong
into fantasy and nostalgia then be real and brave.
Face the music you composed so to speak
and learn it's not all badness on the other side.

I would have liked to imagine that many years down the line
we could have been friendly to each other.
Thrown away the impossibility of love realized between us,
moved on, been adults about this and let it go instead of holding onto the pain forever, found better partners more suited to us,
and still been able to share a friendship.

What I had with you as a lover, and a best friend
meant more to me than would warrant just simply throwing away
because I refused to move on from the pain of the past.
And yes, you've hurt me quite a great deal in the course of this relationship
but not so much for me to see that as something that wouldn't fade away.

I mean...that's not entirely true.
I think on some level I would always see you as a kind of silly wrecking ball
but that's part of your charm, the ability to be a catalyst for others to change.
But I think eventually, so much of me would be fortified and gratified with having moved on from this cat and mouse shit that I would not have feared the effects of your orbit any longer.

I mean why would a jackhammer fear a wrecking ball anyway?
We have different purposes, but we function in kind.
I mean that's what I attribute the length of this experiment to in all honesty anyway.
And if you're trying to communicate some poetic truth backinto my face
after having read my poems recently,
then don't.
Don't hold onto that pain.
Let it go.
That's why I'm writing about it.
That's why I'm performing it.

To speak the condition into existence and then let it go.
So please, be more like the you I actually know,
be kind to yourself and to me.
Let it go, and stop cluttering up the interim
with convoluted poetry that doesn't reflect the truth
only the pain.

Because I have had enough of pain
and I'd like to just remember you in love and friendship
and not acrimony.

Truth Be Told

It is not all resentment laying heavy on my heart these days that pushes me forward.
There is a certain satisfaction in a job well done.
I believe I couldn't have let this rest without it's second trial.

But a third, I am not willing to negotiate.
I need more
Want more
deserve more
at present moment than we were ever able to bring each other.

You are a person I will look at with fondness when
our history is a simple memory left to antiquity,
but I will always wonder why?

Not why did it break down,
I know the reasons for that.
But why?
Why did you wait so long?
Six months at least you kept me hanging on the end of this disconnected line
and the reality is, it may have been the entirety of our relationship.

There is a certain measure of validation
that I have been saying we were not meant to be
in the long term at least
all along.

But the possibilities between us
were so blinding
so tantalizing
and you sold them
like fresh cuts of meat so I bought them.
Because I was hungry.
Convinced myself I was starving but it didn't matter.
I was on hunger strike when I met you.

Truth is, you could have been anyone hocking your wares
and I would have taken you.
But plain and simple,
you were you
fresh meat
and raw blood
I craved the tenderness of your flesh
the unabashed restraint in your calculated
affairs.

I thought it would keep us both safe
until we blossomed into otherness.
You said it yourself,
I was your "wet dream incarnate."
but dreams, are either built or best left to fantasy.

And we were neither and both in the same breath always.
A no man's land of what ifs
and if onlys.
And I took them to heart anyway.

Knowing they wouldn't last.
This is my own folly,
but also yours to share.

I was desperate.
Desperate for a chance to prove to myself that love
was worthwhile
it was worth investing in despite the obvious losses
despite the futility of age difference,
and life experience.

I suppose what drew me to you in the beginning
was a certain level of recognition.
Knowing others is knowing oneself
and I wasn't ready to let that chapter close yet.

I needed to see this through with you on the other end
of that arrangement to know,
it was at least possible.

Even if in the end
it was only regaled to the realm of fantasy
and superstition.

You existed.
And therefore so did I.
And from that I learned
that existence is precipitated by intention.

Mutual or individual alone,
still it carries on its own signature.
And so in other lifetimes we will love each other
more wholly and perfectly than we did in this one.

In that other place,
you will be the one at my side during childbirth,
during my fade into croneing years ungracious as fuck,
and there holding my hand on my deathbed
as I light to another cycle.

But in this world, it is not meant to pass.
And so I know with a kind of calm certainty
as I did when I met you-
we will meet again.

In other times not yet fathomed
but now
it is not meant to carry out to that end.

It's painful,
but beautiful to recognize
we're both of us
not on the losing end
for having found each other
even for a moment in this life.

There were always other options
always other paths
always other potentials on the horizon.

I thought I said farewell to them.
Even for this short clip of time
because I wanted to see this through
to its end.

And now that it has arrived,
a blazing sunset
I know there will be a new dawn
to race like chariots across this plane
I call my heart.

And I will carry you with me
like a locket in my heart
bearing your name and birthday
probably always
even subconsciously
out of that desire alone
to have seen you this time
and had this time
be the one we said yes to.

But I know somewhere out there
is the future we are destined for
on our own
each path cutting swathes through a crowded wood
and I will always be happy
I chose the one less trod
if it led me close to you
even for a fleeting moment in time.

Single

There is a certain relief in being unfettered now.
There is a kind of upward bouncy of no longer being tied to a sinking stone.
This is life is in many respects more worthwhile now that is it lacking the confines of a relationship left to wither.

A relationship I never intended to turn out this way...
but...
We do not always understand the ways in which we are in charge of our own destiny.
The Fates do their best to test you.

And you and I have been a test I do not frown upon
as a failure-
simply put it was more a collection of mistaken identities.

I believe that there was a reason we were to meet
just as there are obviously an overwhelming amount of very good reasons
we were meant to part as well.

I can only say that I learned what I believe I was meant to
through this journey
and I will take those lessons to heart
as I move into an endless sea of possibility.

And I hope that the lessons I have learned will stick around
so that I don't have to keep repeating them
although I am fairly certain,
I will need to learn new ones
as these are rather firmly entrenched now.

You taught me I could love again
you taught me it could be sweet
and giving and passionate.

But you also taught me about things I don't want.
for myself.
in a partner.
in a lifetime.
in my family.

And so I'm actually not feeling too sorry for myself
being single now.
Everyone seemingly agrees "You're doing really well."
I attribute this to the fact that once this wound heals
I know what I want, and I'll be ready for it when it finds me.

But I'm not in a rush.
I'm enjoying this space now, although some aspects of it are
more challenging than others.
I know better than to go looking.
That's not how you showed up after all anyway.

Insulating Wards

Sit straight backed but relaxed
concentrate on the movement of your breath
how your stomach gently rises and falls.
Notice how your chest stretches too much accommodate
direct the focus downwards.

Recognize this as habitual over compensation
Know it is a response to having lost enough breath to flat line.
Accept that this truth is not the present before you, but the past
which you have long left behind you.

Direct the focus downwards
Plant yourself like roots in the earth.
Feel it blossom underneath you
connecting everything to itself
a root system of energy and signals
that are ordinarily ignored.

Remember to remain aware of your breath
sink into the sensation of being grounded
let the soil hold you until you are still.
Direct the focus to your center.

Feel this, oneness with breath
oneness with all
oneness with oneself.
Notice the subtle shift of atmosphere
as the circle radiates outwards
fissuring in clockwise fashion from whence you have conjured it.

Note the color
see how it follows the motion of your breath.
Ask it forth from the ground,
when it hovers like static smoke ring around you-
send it spinning.
Repeat until 3 rings spin a sphere of light about you.
Listen to the tinny sound it makes.

Draw a line outside the circle
notice the punchline to a centuries old joke
as you follow each corner with another line.
Alternate white and black.

Square the circle.
Triple it.
Draw these lines upwards and down
create walls
affix a floor somewhere beneath you in time and space
attach a ceiling.
Seal the joints with the steady rhythm of your breath.

Focus inwards
Let each chakrah bloom radiant and unfurling
Do not fight the sensation of energy being drawn to you this way
ask it to reside here, inside the walls of these three domains.

Fill the space between with enough light to blind you.
Repeat the mantra
"As above, So below."
cycle
expand
dismiss.

Thank the breath for remaining steady.
Ask the wards what it wishes to keep out most
Cry when it hisses her name and "danger" in the same breath.
Plead for guidance.
Hope for strength.

Pray that in the center of your being
the wards you crafted tonight will stick longer
than the last few.
Send each ring downwards one at a time into the earth.
Follow them counterclockwise with your eyes as they diffuse.

Stand straight backed but relaxed
concentrate on the movement of your feet across the carpet
how your feet gently rise and fall.
Notice how you move forward one step after another
direct the focus inwards.

Recognize this as habitual under compensation
Know it is a response to having lost enough loved to become jaded.
Accept that this truth is not the present before you, but the past
which you have long left behind you.

Slippage

And so it goes my darling
It is all slipping away now.
One memory after another
1,250 days with you lodged in my heart
Fading into the background of history
that will never repeat itself again.

One errand mailbox after another
swept up in the tides of my receding love for you.
And I feel so lonesome for the comfort of your presence
I could just slip away with it all too.
Just lay there and let the water carry me downstream
feeling the familiarity of it tickling at my sinuses.
Knowing that if I just took one deep breath
I could end this now
and spare myself the grief.

And I'm crying tonight
Each tear a love letter I'll never write to you again.
Each gasp catching in my throat a poem which you will never hear.
The slow march of water
and the way she loves her gravity
is bearing me away from this place of nostalgia
and heartache.

The cut is through the bone
sharp, deep, and splinter stinging-
But not bearing the mercy of heat to cauterize.
I am raw and fragile in your absence.

And although I am not waiting
for a world of what ifs any longer
I am stunned with sadness that those dreams
I shared with you
will never be real.

And sadder still,
is the revelation
the day is fast approaching
that I will wake up
and find I no longer love you.

No longer see your smile as I once did
breathtaking and broken.
I will not see you and remember your name.
I will not recall your body with fondness.
Won't long to reach out and touch your face.
Won't laugh myself hoarse with you by my side.

And this passing
this current of change
is not something I fight
but for the grief of its
brevity.

Or perhaps it is the length of it-
Such an odd round number
divided into endless iterations
that has me spilling milk
just to sob over it tonight.

And they tell me
"this too shall pass"
and I hope it does.
Because at present moment
I do not think I will ever look at you
and not see you as the end of the world.

A thunderclap
I will cower from
if you strike too close to my skin.
A gathering of clouds I do not stop to divine any longer
but rather run head long for cover where you cannot reach me.
A rumble somewhere deep in the soil
I feel even through shaky feet.

A storm that took more than my home with it
when it left.
It took the safety of certainty-
The love of joy's visits when it came to
knock on my doorstep.
The equal to my passion I thought was reflected.

And we can blame it
on every raindrop individually if we want to
We can name each one a different excuse one by one:
"We grew apart."
"We wanted different things."
"The timing was off."
"It was too much."
"We changed."
"We loved each other, but love isn't always enough."

But none of that
is going to make up
for the flood I let loose tonight
and eventually
I will have to collect the refuse
and take out the trash.

300 Thread Count Canyon

When I keep myself awake at night
it is to fill this waiting space
a crater left in the hollow of my arms
where your form once rested.

As unmistakable as the feeling of a
wanton pebble sifting around in my shoe-
When you moved I felt you
even in the dark
even through the woolen thickness of slumber.

And I noticed months ago
when you started pulling away
inching away slowly
pressing yourself flat against the farthest wall.

Fear tore through me like a horse loose on the highway
That you would rather embrace the slow crawl of transparent window
than the heartbeat lodged in my chest
the softness of labored breath
and the cradle of my body against you.

The shift of your retreating weight
and the sigh of excuses you left in your wake
was one clamoring hoof beat after another.
I can be oblivious when I want to
but I am no idiot girl
I could hear the stampede
long before the horses arrived.

I spent so many nights trailing my fingers
across the softness of your spine
measuring the space left between us
as it opened up-
a 300 thread count canyon
I didn't know how to cross anymore
than to roll over
and press my spine to yours
like a pair of itchy cricket legs.

Ambulance wail lullabies and the awkward heat
hissing from our parted bodies
made the nights spent at your side
each more painful than the last.

But it's not the endless dreams of you
I am avoiding.
It's not the smell of you lodged deep
in my pillows still that causes me to want to drag
the bed into the nearest field and set to blazes.

It is the memory of your face looming before my eyelids
every morning when I would wake up before you
and see that your head
still rested so close to mine.
Close enough to reach out and kiss you
in the early morning sunlight.

I would spook like a nervous one trick pony
and stare at your face gone slack
no fissured brow or vacant glances to sidestep.
I kept these moments secret
and drifted back into sleep
so you could think you were still the one
that always woke up first.

Pinned these images under the bed legs
like worn horseshoes
and hoped that soon
I would still feel rested when I woke up
and you would no longer be there.

But around this time every night
I remember when we fit ourselves together
the strength of a steel bit
clutched between speeding teeth
and hugged barrel race curves
until dawn pried our eyelids loose
and shook the sleep from our eyes.

Fireflies

You are a firefly
blinking rhythms that are as easy to predict
as the weather that encapsulates each season.
And the light at the end of your tail
as it goes streaming out of sight
is something I understand
but no longer wish to respond to.

I wave you away from mason jars
that no longer bear your name,
seal the windows shut with good intentions
block the gaps in the doorjambs with enough strength
to make me believe this will keep you out
if only so you will stop letting your cousin's frozen bodies
fill my wallpaper.

And you, keep lighting up the night sky
keep snapping your wings too loudly against the air.
Keep acting like you are something you are not.
A late to bloom june bug
fattened and lazy bumping into walls
and calling it amusing.

I never wanted to catch you.
Wasn't interested in how you would look
pinned under glass
and lightless.
Had no need for the small print of genus and phillum
underneath you.

I just wanted to know how you shine that way.
Wanted to hold you in my palm for a moment
and notice the warmth as you lit up and then faded away.
But you, kept thinking you were something you are not.
A cicada, which is often mistaken for locusts.

I knew better when I saw you
you wouldn't bring plague or ruin
but you did mistake my arms for tree limbs
and attempted to feed.

Attempted to nest in my heart valves
I got tired of fighting you off
the buzz of your wings persistent and unending
I let you love me
even though I knew we wouldn't last through the season.

I forgot that just because we both had wings
it didn't mean we were meant to fly in the same direction.
I'll admit it.

This ragged jersey moth got tired of keeping
the moon, something so large and unattainable
on my left to navigate
that I let the light bulb of your halo
send me into circles.

A slow dizzinging nose dive of sweetness
after so much forceful wind thrust in my face.
A cyclone of summers and hot nights
I spent swinging around the end of a light bulb
whose switch was constantly being flicked on and off.

And I have just enough reserve left
to remember the moon
and how it shined for me once
kissing the curve of the earth clear and steady
that I left the fireflies to burn out alone.

Paper Dolls

When I met you you were a paper doll.
Scotch tape stitched together,
rough around your edges,
paper pulp skin and shredder mark scars.

And I was a paper tiger
chasing my tail
and threatening to catch fire
in an effort to better hide my stripes.

We made origami of our limbs and cut ourselves
on the sweetness of lust grown love.
Rent fragile bound hearts from stubborn accordion chests
and paper machéd our wet skin to each others mouths.

Three short years and my how you've grown.
You have become larger than life-
A neon carnival billboard pasted outside my cage bar doors.
The perfect tiger taming temptress
framing the pin up complexion of a young woman's form
in cheesy 70s font: "My Dream Girl."

So can I fold my heart into a paper airplane and send it
sailing into your arms?
Can we stop this game of rock-paper-scissors now
and admit that every dollar I spend
to buy you trinkets and treasures
has been secretly crafted into the shape
of an engagement ring
you will still not say "yes" to without reservation?

I remember when my nose bent to your curls
how you spelled rich of aspen on the wind.
How I had a fleeting moment where I forgot
tigers, even paper ones, do not make good bookmarks.
And I bent under the scratch of your fingernails
as strong as whale bone
creasing my skin.

Let you write love letters in the spaces
between my branding mark scars
and felt the pinch of your spit laced fingers
snuffing out my tail each time I tried to self combust.
For you I learned that some leaps of faith
only leave the sizzle of singe singing on your eyelids
but the light is too bright to close your eyes.

The heat too powerful to keep from roaring
even after it is gone.
That life sometimes seems like a circus
program which is easily swept away when the
paper tents have been packed in for the night.

In the end you threatened to throw yourself into the Atlantic
and float to another island.
Fire was one thing, but salt water another.
I was tired of the sound of paper tearing like whip cracks in the air
Our parting the ache of raw hands after punishing telephone books
for seeming so sturdy.

We were only paper after all.
As I paced the shoreline like a pair of scissors
the last ties between us went slack
and you drifted apart into another form atop the water.

But I remember when we were just two trees
growing side by side in the forest
how I wound my roots into yours
to hold you upright against me
when a creek bed yawned wide around your base.
And our rings grew into each others.

But that was long before
they cut us down
and made us into paper dolls.

Simple

Nothing is simple in this space.
It has been a week already since you ended things so poorly
and I find myself wishing more time had passed already.

I find myself impatient in this journey, like there is no amount of distance I would love to put between us that I could find gratifying.

And this emotion, that I once cherished so deeply
now feels parasitic.
That even though the tick's body has been wrenched free, the head remains
embedded in my skin. And I'm aware it will continue to grow back
until I light its tail end with match flare warning or drown it in the
fluid embrace of water.

I have waves of lingering sadness that ebb and flow throughout each day.
Tears I refuse to unleash any longer for you or for me.
I don't want them.
In the same ways that I am still not ready to see you.
Can't stand the memory of the scent of your perfume any longer,
something that seemed so hauntingly beautiful before I now find
repugnant.
And the memory of your voice
fills me with a hollow sense of dread instead of happiness like it used to.
I am still too filled with cowardly impulses myself
things I will have to encounter and release before I remember to stop
walling up and treating you like a rogue enemy.

And you are as ever
pervasive and insistent even now in your absence.
You keep popping up on the horizon, the tease of a buoy
when I feel like I have been treading water until my limbs turned to lead.
I want to stop swimming and give in to the impulse to drown.

But you are no buoy.
You are a mirage borne of desperation
and seasick longing.
You are the smell of shoreline
when I am lost in blue waters alone.

And the sharks my darling
are circling ever closer.
I can feel them - fins under foot
inquisitive noses nudging at my fragile spine.
It is a matter of time now
before the strike of their teeth
serrates through my tender skin.

And I wonder if everyone else can see it.
If it is as transparent to them as it is to me.
I am raw and aching for something I no longer desire.
Like a weeping raspberry longs for the skin it left
on the kiss of aggregate pavement.

I always was one to wear my heart on my sleeve.
Perhaps that is why I can't stop falling in love with the impossible
instead of what would be more real and therefore more wonderful.
It is the slow telling of this story,
our story,
and the cheap adolescent ending
over and over in endless repitition
that has caused me to feel so exhausted with this already.

I am tired of having to clean up this mess you left behind you
with diplomacy and grace.
I am tired of seeming stoic when I feel I am caving in.
I am tired of feeling like breaking down over this.

But I simply refuse.
I won't and so I can't.
I cannot let you take this from me,
my life, and my future
after all I have done to build it up
just because you decided to not to share it with me.


So I keep going out.
I keep staving off the tears
that strike from no where
traitors to their master
mercenaries for your cause.

And I keep avoiding you.
But you...you silly buoy
bob about, blinking in and out of sight.
hiccuping in and out of my heartbeat.
So I'll grab at the nearest jaws
unhinging below my dangling feet
and let it carry me down
where the sound of your voice
will be only a distant echo
for the need for the weakness of air
filling my lungs.

Flirtation

There is something to this process
the ability to blossom into my own being fully this time around
that I beginning to enjoy so very much.

It took devastation and ruin to pull me to a place of action last time
and now, the path is being tread already as we speak
and I find myself diving headfirst into it
without questioning where it will lead me.

I'm in my own very good hands for a while yet though.
And that is perfection in my mind right now.
Nothing to worry about but my own forward progression
towards the people that will lead me to the relationship that will last.

And I will say people
Because in all probable likelihood it will take people to bring us together.
I don't know who they are yet.
It could come out of anywhere.
The poetry hasn't been written yet-
but in time I will chronicle the passage from one heart
until the next
until I meet the one I am meant to share my own with.

And this could possibly take several beds
to help and influence the decision.
But I'm prepared to do what I must.
It'll make those moments, that lifetime,
so much sweeter when I look back to see what I had to come through
to achieve it.

Life is an adventure
and I am feeling more and more like a pirate these days.
Soon I'll have found my fill of rough seas
and violent battles
to the know the value of treasure worth questing for.

Soon the scars and tattoos and the piercings will all fade away to baubles
in the sight of a life lived rich with possibilities.

I'm through with holding back.
I'll let my heart
and my body
and my spirit guide me
and when I find the destination
it will break upon me
like an angry sun
on the fresh leaves
of a new tree.

Willing to climb
and thrive again.

Hopeless Romantic

I am a hopeless romantic.
And you don't have to worry. This isn't meant for you.
I'm through leaving you veiled messages and mangled metaphors.
I've no time for games of hide and seek.

I know what I want, and I'll get it someday.
Because even though my heart is breaking at the loss of you-
I am in love with life.
Even through the pain of this separation, there is a string of endless moments
of stark and startling beauty all around me.

Today it was the kind of hot that warms you from the inside out,
and the comforting weight of the warm wind coursed through my open palm
as it coasted out the window.
And I couldn't be bothered with sorrow anymore.
I couldn't spare a single tear more for you today.
I was filled with the knowledge that life is beautiful.
And people fall in and out of love all the god damn time.
Some of us, too easily.

But I refuse to be faulted for that.
There's something paradoxical
about the fact that I have had my heart
fall into love and broken by it so often over my life.
Part of me says that I know this is something I want badly enough
to search and work for it.
And part of me says, I've been settling, or getting distracted, or just getting impatient.

So I inflated some people I shouldn't have to a place
where I might have shared my life with them.
Just to say I achieved that state I have so longed for.
But now, I can't deny it.
I'll fall in love, over and over
until I meet the woman who will fall in love with me
over and over everyday for the rest of our lives
the way I will with her.

And you can call it impossible.
Say it's ridiculous.
But I know it happens.
And I know, it's going to happen to me someday.
And I know that to get there, I have to stay open.
I have to not blame love, but rather, come to understand it.
It just does what it is meant to do, it brings people together.

So even if that's only for a short time, or a whole lifespan.
It can, and does happen all of the time.

You would think since I've told you so often by now
that I am fed up with this
that I would have given up on love.
Instead I've found a new kind of faith in it.

Today I listened to love songs, and sang along, and I couldn't have been happier.
In some ways, I have you to thank for that faith.
And in others, I'll have more work before me until I can find a relationship worthy of my emotional and physical investment.

But I'm not scared anymore.
I didn't stay with you for fear of being alone.
I didn't stay with you out of fear at all.
I stayed because I saw value.
I stayed because I saw your core values and fell in love with them.
I stayed. Because I wanted to.

But the fact remains now, I've also changed.
I want different things too.
I want the kind of love I know I will have someday with the same kind of certainty I know I will someday have the family I yearn for.

I'm ready for it, and like you said-
I just haven't found the right person yet.
But I will. I know that I will.

And what we will have together
will be something unconventional I am sure
because I have never loved in any way that could be called
conventional.

Nothingness

I've nothing. Nothing to say to you tonight but the same old tired bullshit I've always said. And this will sound callous, and unforgiving, but on some level I want you to know it. Or better yet, I want me to know it. Because I've long, long given up on you reading these missives. I probably stopped writing them when we got back together the first time because I knew somewhere deep down, you'd stop reading them. You'd stop listening. You'd stop hearing me. And I'm so exhausted.

So very tired of feeling wedded to someone that'd rather be a million miles and spaces away from me than with me. Than in it with me. I knew, somewhere along the lines, that THIS was wasted effort on my part. So I STOPPED WRITING THE LETTERS. Broke my own promises. Broke down and gave in that the strength of the love we felt together in THESE moments was enough to carry us through. That the poems I wrote, that the time I spent, that all I provided you with would have been enough. That somehow-somehow, we'd find a better way of communicating than this....this empty space. These shallow words. These trapped phrases and quicksand proclamations that would fade in time.

Still, because I can only be true to myself I bent until I was nearly at the point of breaking. I tried to demonstrate my love in word and bond instead of just the static of these syllabic phrases grafted into internet either. But this is how you loved me, I have to realize after three and a half years. You loved me, in more ways than anyone before, but only at a distance. Only when the safety of page or screen or distance was between us. And that should have been my first clues. Love is work, but you made it the kind of arduous journey I never knew love could be. Even through the knowledge and experience of my divorce, even through the fall out of an emotionally abusive relationship that followed. Your lack of self knowledge and puerile attitude would have given birth to this. Things layer up, they get too hard, and you withdraw. You've done it every time. And I'm an idiot, a fool to continue chasing you through this game of fox and hound. I see that now.

So I've nothing but bitter and antagonistic lyrics to throw in your face now, songs that I once shared with you; thinking you'd understand me deeply after hearing them...the meaning went missing then clearly, judging by the outcome, so let me repeat them to myself so I know better the next time around:

"Think you're denying me something, but I've got plenty. You're the one whose missing out. But you won't notice. 'Till after five years if you live that long, you'll wake up - all loveless. I dare you, to take me on. I dare you, to show me your palms. I'm so bored of cowards. That say they want, [sic love] but then they can't handle. You can't handle love, you can't handle love. You just can't handle love. I dare you to take me on, I dare you show me your palms, what's so scary? Not a threat in sight. You just can't handle, you just can't handle love. You can't handle love, baby. You can't handle love, it's obvious."

Still, in spite of an overwhelming amount of experience to teach me otherwise, I invested in us. And it's not all your fault. In spite of the circumstances of our final ending, I'm willing to be generous and take blame equally where it is given. I understand, and this is the heart of my anger, and frustration, and total mortifying heartbreak: I allowed this to happen; to myself. And that is where the kickback of disappointment begins and ends really. I shouldn't have. Shouldn't have allowed you to take over so much of my life, and yet distanced you so much. I should have acknowledged that I can be oblivious when I want to, but that I am no idiot. I know, I can hear the hoof beats long before the stampede set in. And I did. I chose instead to buy into your idiot praises. Your malcontent attempts at faith. Your blind optimism in the face of abject failure.

And I hope you understand, the depth of these scathing sentiments comes from the depth of my feelings for you. All my hopes and dreams and fantasies made real rested in your arms, have now come to nothing but pain and heartbreak because you turned callow. Gave up and walked away.

Now you're acting the part. Being brave, being independent enough to grow a backbone and care for yourself. You're working out, you're applying yourself more to your scholarly pursuits, you're acting the part of one that can provide for oneself. I have only questions now left in your absence...Why?

Why couldn't you have done these things WITH me instead of apart? And the questions are as nonsensical as the answer I realize. Because. Because you had to be alone to do them. Because you need to find yourself. Because the timing was off. Because we weren't truly meant for each other in the ways we both thought we were, at least not in this life time. And I know, that I told you, I wouldn't be nasty or vindictive, or callous.

And I'm not trying to be. I love you still, even though I don't want to any longer. Truth be told I have longed to fall out of love with you for sometime. It's been months and I've been waiting to grow a spine and call it off. Call it out for as broken as it was. Stop giving you second and third and fourth and fifth chances and just walk away knowing I did my best, but in this case my best wasn't good enough for either of us.

And I'm a hypocrite for it. I should have left you months ago when you started pulling the strings. Should have told you: No. I deserve more. And if you can't find it in your heart and soul to give it to me, then you are not the one. I sold out. On myself, and that's why I'm angry now. That's why I'm frusterated that you didn't hear it before when I told you my heartfelt confessions. All the nights I spent at the time crying myself to sleep when I was alone, running scared, running on empty. I konw what that was now. I was afraid. Afraid I was losing you, afraid I was finding reasons in your behavior to fall out of love with you. Long before you intiated this break, I was mourning its loss.

All of that, all of it, is my fault.

I have never learned to exit graciously. I have always been the kind to cross the finish line, no matter what place I was taking. Better to cross it, than just walk off the field I was always taught. I have to remind myself, in times like these, that that is not the case for everyone. Some people cannot fail while trying their best and hold their integrity together.

All of these things are my fault. All of this is my doing. All of it is my shortcoming I need to desperately overcome in order to find true love. But until then, Feist's "Inside and Out" plays games with my head and makes me think of you so clearly:

"Love you forever but you're driving me insane, and I'm hanging on. I'll wait I'll never give in, my love has got the power. Too many lovers in one lifetime ain't good for you. You treat me like a vision in the night. Someone that matters behind you when you're world ain;t working right. I aint' no vision. I'm the girl that loves you inside and out. Someone there to stand behind you when your world ain't working right. I ain't no vision, I'm the girl who loves you inside and out.
Backwards and forwards with my heart hanging out. I love no other way. What are we gonna do if we lose that fire? Wrap myself up and take me home again. Too many heartaches in one lifetime ain't good for me. You figure it's the love that keeps you warm let this moment be forever we won't ever feel the storm. I ain't no vision, I'm the girl who loves you inside and out. Backwards and forwards with my heart hanging out. I love no other way. What are we gonna do if we lose that fire? Don't try to tell me that it's over- I can't hear a word I can't hear a lie. No girl could love you more and that's what I'm cryin' for you can't change the way I feel inside. You're the reason for my laughter and my sorrow. Blow out the candle I will burn again tomorrow. No man on earth can stand between my loving arms- And no matter how you hurt me, I will love you till I die. I ain't no vision, I'm the girl who loves you inside and out- backwards and forwards with my heart hanging out. I love no other way. What are we gonna do if we lose that fire?"


These words speak all too clearly to me. And somehow, through the pop tunes or desolation, the optimism convinces me that through the pain there is SOMETHING worth holding out for. But the only problem is, I know better now.

Last night I saw a beautiful death. A coyote had strewn itself across the highway like a pinata. And by then I had driven for hours and I wanted to pull over and fall asleep behind the wheel - but I saw it, and I circled back. I drove until I came across it again, in better lighting, and slower speeds. I wanted to be sure what I had seen. And while I wound my way through the two exits to get to it, I heard "Home" by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes and I for the first time since Thursday, thought of you in the way I want to remember you.

It was love, pure and unadulterated that coursed through me. That spirit of friendship and adore that caused me to stay all this time. That same longing to be with you, in the spirit of giving that allowed me to convince myself to stick it out for your benefit, thinking you'd kick in and do the same for me. And the smile that spread across my jawline nearly broke it. The warmth in my heart more powerful than any whiskey or gin we've bottled yet. And I remembered, I remembered what I had that was so worth losing at your side. But this place, this place is lonely and desolate. You've not been here for a long time. This home, hasn't had you in it since you jumped out the window thinking I was a threat all those months ago.

So girl, be well. I hope you never read these. I hope you run, as you are accustomed to, and never look back. I hope you run straight into yourself, and then into the arms of another who is clearly more suited to love you fully the way you want and need. And in the meantime, I'll be digging out of this hole, even when it caves in on itself. I'll be moving upwards and out, and feel less tarnished and stained by this whole process. And someday...I KNOW IT...I'll find someone to have that home with.

It just can never be you.

Surrender

It's little wonder I feel this way. Shaken, saddened, numb. And yet, so very full of emotions. Too many thoughts to properly catalog and decipher before the next set begins.

Life goes on without you. And it will.

But I have to keep reminding myself, not to cry when I'm working. Not to cave in and fall into the malaise of sadness yawning wide around my heart. Not to wall up, and guard off, but rather to remain open.

Surrender is something I have learned well in my life. This encapsulates my feelings at the present moment so perfectly. Surrender- come and wrap yourself around me like a white flag. There is no fighting this sorrow, only weathering through it.

Only allowing those parts of me I'd like to protect with bitterness and anger like I used to with tenderness and understanding instead. There is depth here to plumb, and I've never been one for the shallows this life offers.

I've spent all day hugging the coastline. Surrounded by opulence, and beauty. Rubbing elbows with the super rich that far surpass me and the limits of my own dreams. And sex appeal, is everywhere.

Yet my thoughts don't turn to you.

Curious. Ordinarily you'd be the focus of my every attention, especially in this regard. I do not find myself longing for the smothering heat of your kiss in this place.

Do not gaze forward into my future and feel the electricity coursing through me that I once found in your arms so powerfully. Perhaps it is simply because in this very regard you have become such a stranger to me. A landscape I once knew as well as my own body, but once the borders were built up and fortified I lost my ability to navigate it. Even with my dreams and hopes.

I am spending my fantasy moments on another kind of woman. Someone I do not as of yet know, but will someday, of that I am most sure. And there are still parts of me that wish it was you I could call "home" in these ways. That I didn't just feel depressed and betrayed when I think of you. That I could stop this love I have instantaneously to save you the pain of my heartbreak.

I don't want to be a distraction for your forward momentum in anyway. And I'll miss you, for a while longer. I'll think of you so often, like an instinctual internal process I cannot explain anymore than remembering to breathe. But I'm not going to hold my breath this time. I'm letting it go- in gasps, and sobs, and screams and laughter. I'm letting it go, little by little. Even though parts of me fight so hard to hold on still.

But what is there left to hold onto anymore, but the doorknob to an empty room?

Reverb

You've had a change of heart of how to deal with this properly. You've agreed to do this the honorable way, face to face. And I'm thankful for that, in ways you can't imagine. Please don't rethink this decision when it come down to it. If this is truly what you want and need to do, then I need you to follow it through to it's logical conclusion. I need you to be brave, and demonstrate the loyalty that I have always tried to give you. I am willing to let you go. I am willing to let you move on and find yourself on your own if you honestly believe that is what you need to do.

And I'm not going to lie. It is devastating. It is beyond troubling to me to come this far and have it all go to waste in the end. It is something I can't fully understand, but I hope to in time. I hope to be able to grow out of this for myself, and come to places of closure and understanding. I am hoping I can retain the ability to trust people, although I feel right now it is so fragile and torn. And I am hoping that eventually in the course of my life I can find some respect in myself to stop swinging around a light bulb on the end of a chain which is constantly flicked on and off.

And I don't want to say these things. I don't want to acknowledge it. I don't want to be aware of it in its slightest working parts. But I'm coming to understand it this time. The trust is gone, and I honestly have no idea how it will ever come back. I can't shelter you from this. I can't tell you everything will be ok, and in the end it will be perfectly as it is to be. I don't know what the future holds for us individually or together or apart. But I'm starting to see where I need to be going for my own needs. I'm starting to understand that the things I have given over are just the patterned effects of wanting something so badly without being able to fully grasp the consequences of one's actions playing into over and over.

I'm tried, I'm worn out. There's been this tidal wave of relief this time, which I have felt guilty for, I'll be honest. But I know what that means. I got worn out working and trying and searching for something that I was carrying the burden of mostly on my own. And this is confusing for both us, and not good for either of this. And I hope you understand, that there's an even split. One side wants you to redact this and come back. And there's another side that is praying you don't. That you understand fully this is obviously in its present state something you are unprepared for. And only time is going to show us both the way forward. Time, which we both have an abundance of, it will help us to heal.

It's a dreaded journey, when all I have is my heart to govern me. But this is the way that I function. And I have to honor the core of me, the way I honor the core of you. And I'm sorry we lost sight of these things together on our own. I can still see it, within you, all around you, and before and behind you. And it is that vantage point that allows me to know with absolute certainty that you will make it through this. Just as I know I will make it through this. I won't deny it. I don't want to go through this process on some level. I don't want to cry anymore. I don't want to jump through all these loops of fire. I don't want to stumble through the stages of grief and growth through pain. I want to comfort of certainty and I just want to close my eyes and wake up five years in the future next to my partner and look back on this for what it was, a wonderful raw powerful intense growth period. A relationship that brought me joy, and pain, and adventure. But an adventure whose chapter has come to a close.

The only thing I can say at this point now is I tried my very best. For me, for you, for both of us. And now I have to move forward and try my very best to release us both. To free us from this bond of torture and shallow offers of comfort. I believe that love is worthwhile. I believe that they way I love is something uncommon, something that people are not used to and do not engage in for the majority anymore. But I know, that when I get through this, I will be able to find the right place and time to give that love away the way that I do, and someone will offer it back.

And I'm not disclosing full blame onto you. I'm aware of the ways that you tried, I'm aware of the effort you put in, I'm aware of the ways that you love me and did love me, and honored me. We are both far from perfect, and there is the illusion of hope in my heart "someday, someday..." "Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps..." But there is love, that ties us together. And there is something else that is waiting on the other side, together and apart that will allow us to find what we both deserve and need. So until next time we speak. Be well. Challenge yourself. Grow. Grieve. Process. And have your adventures. Trust that I will be doing the same. Echoing love, echoing hope, echoing the future that we both will wind up in that is proper and gratifying for our own dreams to come true.

Mistaken

I'm not sure how to say it without sounding judgmental. So I will just tell you straight out, and hope you understand I mean this with the best of intentions and good humor, there's not a trace of malice or bitterness. There is only love, there is only hope, and and effort to understand you. Still, even though you tell me things in your heart have changed, but you can't tell me how. Even though you tell me you love me still when I speak you. And who knows what the hell that even means anymore. It could mean a thousand things. It could mean you simply care for me. It could mean you want me to be well. It could mean you are still in love with me, but you don't know how to love me anymore. It could mean, I don't want to do this, but I feel like I have to. It could mean I do want to do this, and I've been unhappy for a long time and that's why I'm letting you go. It could mean, I want to be with you, but I don't know how.

And I don't assume to know what's right or wrong in this. I'm not in charge of your destiny, I never was. I never wanted to be. I just wanted to share it with you. I just wanted to support you through the changes, to be your companion, your friend, your lover through it. And unfortunately...I believe that for whatever reason, you believe you are not able to break through, change, grow, and find what you want in this life without being alone. Please, correct me if I am wrong, tell me it is something altogether different. That it's not that relationships like the one I tried to give you make you feel trapped. That you fear the failure and fall out so you leave on a high note before things get much worse. That you leave the door open a tiny crack everytime you go.

Please tell me otherwise, this has happened twice now, I'm starting to get a feel for this. Every time you have given up and walked away from this, and I say that again, without any reservation of love in my heart for you. But you have given up and walked away twice now. Tell me, how after three years of happiness, something nebulous can change and you just let it go. You just left it dissipate. You didn't come to me when you had the inklings, you just pulled away more and more, until you told me you couldn't stay any longer. How does that make sense really? I know. It's love, Blythe. It's not rational. It's not meant to make sense. Just as it is not meant to be goverened or controlled or idly experimented with.

I am aware it was not always perfect. It had it's ups and downs, its challenges, it's grievances, but when I look back on I remember us being inordinately happy. Didn't you feel the same way? Or was it all a charade? I can't believe that really. I know that you were. And even very recently you were happy I believe, I don't believe you just said these things to buy into the fantasy. I believe you are scared, and trying to act in the interest of fairness and good will and remarkably, still in the spirit of deep love.

But I'll tell you, I believe you are making a mistake. What kind of mistake that is has of yet, been undetermined. And perhaps really, we have just been a collection of mistakes and educated guesses along the way. Choices we made thinking we knew what was happening, when really we were responding to the stimulus of our present surrounding. And the only thing I can't really understand is why you keep thinking you can walk out on this and have things return to normal. That life will just carry us along and away from each other that simply. I hope to god that for the things I have learned in this relationship I can find someone who is brave enough to see this life through with me. Someone who wants me that bad to kick in the afterburners and stay, and work for me, and with me, and love me and love with me. The only problem is, well it's cliche, and you won't believe me anyway, but this love is just not going to go away. I unfortunately for you and for me both in this situation will always love you, whether I should or not, whether I want to or not. A heart is not for keeping to oneself, it is for giving away. And as of now, you have the bulk of mine. And it will remain for you, underneath every guise and glamour I can devise to poison it and rid it of my soul. It will remain. That much I know to be truth. So I suppose I'll just have to learn to lie to myself over time in order to move on.

But please, know this now, if it comes down to it someday that I don't tell you I love you anymore-it does not mean that I don't. It only means I learned how to lie again to my very own heart.

Just In Case

If you are wondering how I feel about you in this moment, it remains the same.

I love you.

In mind, and body, and especially in spirit.

Parts of me, very dear and tender parts of me always will. And they may become calloused over in time, worn and ragged now though they seem. They will heal. It is the nature of this body to scar over, to fill in the holes left vacant with dead space.
Spaces reserved for you that will not feel fully again. Only phantom pangs, and muscle memory wired through habit and history, but they will remain. Living entities we birthed together tied to memories that I will not discard, or erase, or ever hope to replace even when another fills my heart with passion. I will carry you, this way- a scar upon my breast forever.

A wounded lonely sparrow, a rusted handcuff key, a whisper in the darkness.

You mean more than these shallow sub-dermal things to me. We had three and half years together, a nice long run...But clearly, the time has all spent now. And I was foolish, so very foolish, to think that this could be mine forever. Such things, my sweetness are just not meant to last. I know that now.

The death card I pulled yesterday looms on white horseback-nosing for the sting of sweetened apples in fields of fallow.
We have come to pass. I understand it, but I cannot fathom it fully.

Shock, you are a mercy.

Though the tears spill still, I know they will dry once the creek bed of my heart has run dry.

I am sorry. Sorry that I couldn't be enough for you, although I tried. My Gods I tried.

And the only things that are left to say are:
good luck,
and I'll miss you,
and I'm rooting for you,
where ever life takes you.

But for now...
at least...
this is goodnight and goodbye.

In the cards

Today you started a new chapter in the saga of your scholarly pursuits. I could not be prouder to be your partner in this moment. I always look forward to the new semesters ahead for you, because I know that through your growth and the things you learn, you teach others, including myself. I am trying not to be a bother to you, but the excitement of the classes you are now orienting yourself in, reconnecting with friends and professors, the opportunities for community service and academic excellence you have in store, are all on my mind as I went about my day. I hope you don't resent the attention. It is not meant to distract or annoy, but simply display my support of you in this life long pursuit of continued education. It is my deepest wish that you continue always to learn, because it brings you so much joy and for me, so much pride as your lover. I remain as always your steadfast cheerleading squad. Although, I am all too aware, you are completely capable of rising to the challenges each semester brings you all on your own. I just like you to know I applaud you in finding and following your passion.

Today I found myself centering more in the present. Discarding my recent fears as much as possible about the future, and letting myself become aware of all the good I have at present moment to focus on. I'm sorry that lately my fears have been coming up and causing some issues between us. I'm am sorry too that I realized today, I have had trouble listening and really hearing what you have had to say, because I have been allowing my personal fears to insulate my hearing bone. I spent some time last night after we spoke meditating on my key tattoo and reminding myself to be present to you and the words you say. Because so far, you have actually displayed your love for me time again, and also a desire to stay, at least in the present with me as your partner. I'm sorry I have been asking so much for additional attention and security. I've been rather emotional lately, I think the stress of my health issues, and the situation with my finances have been very troubling to me. I'm sorry that because of my issues, I have been distracting or difficult to deal with. I am working on that to change consciously. I'm starting my regular meditation routine again, and I'll be getting some medical testing done very soon to balance out those issues.

I don't expect answers in concrete, and I don't want to put undue pressure on you, me, or us. With that in mind, I asked my tarot cards for some guidance today, on how best to serve us both independently, and as a couple to retain the happiness between us that I always feel no matter the circumstances we find ourselves in. It was a really informative and grounding reading, so I was happy for that guidance, because ultimately, I am committed to our happiness and health. What it told me was to calm down. To stop looking for famine in the future and enjoy the feast before me. That these recent pockets of turbulence were passing away into the past, and before me lay you as you grow and change over the coming months through school and new possibilities opening up for both of us.

It was exactly the advice I needed. And paired with the recent lunar activity I found it quite insightful. We won't have as much time this weekend to spend together as we usually do, since I have to work all day Sunday on site in Pebble Beach. But this I see now as a kind of great easing into the semester for you. We can spend Friday and Saturday enjoying each other in the present and the happiness and closeness we share, and then on Sunday you can be home preparing for the school week ahead while I earn some extra cash I so desperately need.

I've done a lot of mental searching inwardly in the last 3 days, and discovered that what has been going on for me is a lot of stress compounding needless fears. I realize through my actions and attitude I may have been pushing you away. And for that, I am deeply regretful. But I did want to take the time to say thank you to you. Because even though we have had disagreements as of late that we both don't find fulfilling, you have stuck it out and communicated with me. You have, even when you may not have wanted to, stayed and displayed loyalty to your love for me by talking it out and then allowing us the mental and emotional space to be able to move on and have great experiences of bonding and happiness afterwards. I see this as growth for us, since before in the past, one or the other of us would have run away from the confrontation and isolated ourselves. Instead, now we try to break through to a healthier communication style, air things out between us, and then move back into a loving space. I am more aware now, after you speaking to me on Sunday about the way I need to deal with my own feelings, stress, fears, and communication style in the future between us to avoid undue hurt feelings and display the true love and respect I carry for you so deeply in my heart of hearts.

I won't be bothering you much about these things anymore, I find the letters I can write to you here allow me the time and space to be able to communicate calmly, and they allow you to get to them when you want. But I do hope, you are as excited as I am to enjoying the time we spend together, in happiness, and in more balanced ways. Please know that I adore you and I am always here, not going anywhere. I support you and I look forward to the time we can come together and share ourselves, our dreams, and our visions. In the meantime, grow baby, grow endlessly.

Always yours.

Scrying

I know...I know there's no point in saying these things. But still, I want to grant you this window..this vantage point into my mind and my heart. I'm not gifted with foresight always, not in any way beyond what survival has taught me. But I have to tell you, I love you. And these words, I am all too certain really mean too little. They represent so many things, the meaning is often misconstrued. Are you aware, I often wonder, what I mean when I say that? It is something I have felt too lightly before meaning you. A meaningless phrase I was willing to give anyone to ensure they would stay. I have abandonment issues, I know this to be true.

But with you, I was careful. I was patient as I could be before disclosing this truth. Because even with our challenges, of age difference, of life circumstances, of viewpoint on the world, and differing passions, I knew- if I were to say this to you, you were the last person I WANTED to say this to for the rest of my life. To me, when I tell you I love you, something so simple and ordinary, it should represent all the extraordinary things I feel for and about you. And to that I remain, steadfast, loyal, unwavering. I love you, with all of my being. And I aware, after my many but still short years in this life-cycle that I COULD love again if you were to leave me, but not this way. Not the ways in which I love you. That alone is reason to stay, to grow with you, and also for myself.

I only find myself wondering these days if this remains truth for you. I have an obnoxious habit of letting my fears run-away train with themselves. To spiral from small things into hydras that seem almost insurmountable. It is for this reason I detest the phrase "don't become a self-fulfilling prophecy." And I try, I try so desperately to listen, to trust, to believe what you tell me in the present. To let that be my guide when my cynical nature takes hold and conflates little things, in a layer cake of doom before me bearing my name. I wish I could make more sense for you. I wish I could be more confident, the way you seem to be.

It is the worth of what I have with you that causes this fear. With you I can actually see growing old together, being more than just satisfied with my life, but actually happy. I know like you said tonight about other friends in newly single present tense, that I could find love again. I hope you understand what I mean when I say, I don't want to. You are my favorite ice cream flavor, rocky road. And I find myself saying, I could if it came down to it, find a liking for other flavors- butter pecan, or vanilla, or just plain chocolate. BUt why would I look any farther when I already have found my rocky road? A stupid metaphor, to be sure. And one not worthy of comparison to you, but still....Why would I look further, for something that was staring me eye to eye.

I only wonder if you still feel the same. This is the heart of me asking, over and over to tell me what you love about me, about being with me beyond simple answers. This is the heart of my search for something deeper between us. I fear, my sweet, I fear- that I am not enough for you. That I am not worthy, that time or distance will tear us apart. Please...I don't need guarantees. I am just wondering...do you still feel the same? Would you follow me to the end of your days? The way I would for you, gladly. A song in my heart and a warmth in my soul that would never fade.