i'm sorry i seem weak to you.
i'm sorry you're not used to swimming in my brash words,
my confidence in myself.
i'm sorry you're intimidated by me,
by my successes and dreams for a future you're not included in.
i'm sorry you couldn't see me for the beautiful person i am;
i'm sorry you didn't learn earlier that i do not tolerate abuse.
but mostly i apologize to myself
for putting my body through the kind of pain it went through,
the kind of pain i called loving you.

he told me that my voice sounded like the chiming of church bells,
hauntingly beautiful and sure.
he told me that i tasted like the skin of a grapefruit,
sweet then sour
not long before i became tough.
i never knew what to make of that.
he told me that i felt like a rose petal,
soft and delicate
fragile enough to rip with the twisting of fingers
but strong enough to make it through the storm.
and through everything
i thought it was love,
i thought he took my breath away
but really i was suffocating on his empty words.
what i never told him
but will now,
is that
church bells scare me
i hate grapefruit
and i am stronger than a flower,
strong enough to survive the storm
that was him.

i used to dream in black and white,
grays blending together the scenes that
spin spin spin
until i can't differentiate black from white.
i dreamt about shriveling flowers and endless hallways
and never being able to scream;
and then i met you.
suddenly i was dreaming in color,
a luxury i thought would never come to fruition,
flowers popping and life breathed back into trees.
i never knew how beautiful it was to have someone hold you at 3am,
to kiss your bruises and tell you your scars are angelic
even though the way you acquired them isn't.
i never knew how beautiful it was
to dream in color.

my heart has turned dark,
blood frigid in my veins.
my mind was never so convoluted,
thoughts so dark.
i used to be a different girl, and to be honest,
i miss her.

and when the fingers of age
grace her face,
for it does not matter-
i'll love her the same.

when her chestnut ringlets
turn to silver strings,
for i don't mind-
i'll still be her king.

so i'll love you true,
through and through,
i swear till i'm blue-
it's always you.

you and me till the end of time,
from the day i promised, fingers entwined,
that i am yours
and you are mine,
my bride, my pride,
till the end of time.

autumn tinges the world an earthly orange
as the leaves fall at a lazy pace,
littering the ground with the only litter this world should allow.
a shooting star falls from the sky
showering us with bits of moonlight
and age-old stars,
glimmering with what used to be.
i,
for you,
i fall for you with the audacity of a best friend
no holding back and nothing to break my fall.
when it comes to the art of falling
i can only pray to God you'll be there to catch me.