I’ve got four dollars and a nickel in the pocket of my sweater that is worth more than the last one thousand words we’ve shared. I can’t give you the cadence in my voice even though God knows I’ve tried. Words fall out of your mouth and I try to pick them up to make sense, but they are buried in mine that you’ve torn and twisted and scorched. I love me more than I love you and I won’t apologize for it. I started to lose that love, that zest, when I lent more worth to your life than mine. It’s quite the paradox that life often gets in the way of the very things that constitute living. Those are things we were taught to want, to need.
I’m really damn tired of making decisions, but my right to make them is something I cannot forfeit. It’s the promises and expectations I could really do without. You can have those like you took my cheesecake and my words and my heart. I’d like that back along with the time I spent convincing myself I needed your fulfillment and your presence. I’m careful and calculated and consuming. Sweet reasoning begs tenderly and tugs at my heart every time my head winces at your name. Being naïve would surely be better than being aware.
We’ve adopted a corrupt notion of forever that is rooted in apathy. We masquerade as if we’re complacent at best, innocent – better ignorant, of what lies ahead. We clench a fervent desire to fabricate a life that fits neatly into a picture frame above the mantle, a life that is simply understood, though callous and empty beneath the glass sheathe. The stained glass that guards my soul contorts the forever you say you want so I cannot see the same. I see hues of blue and purple that wane to greys and blacks. I see storm clouds and shadows and seclusion. It is as though I drew up a contract and begged you to sign; I brought it inside after I dropped it in a puddle and lovingly flattened and dried the crumpled mess. The words are smudged and the signatures faded, but I misguidedly still think the covenant stands.
Don’t ask me what I want – that’s as fleeting as a sun setting on an unruffled ocean. Yet, for every ephemeral wish or transient thought, I bound myself tighter to you, to your heart. Like an infant suckles, I teethe on the prospect of the eternity you want. Wanted? It’s clear that we are in limbo and inching, sprinting further from that framed forever.
