We hate good-byes, yet we say it too often. After a phone call. After a visit. When classes end. When we leave a restaurant. Perhaps these tiny good-byes are said too much to prepare us for the greater good-byes of the future.

But isn't it just strange how the things we hate are often what our mouths are full of? And with the same mouth we whisper the sincerest 'I love you's'.

We love. And the ones we love leave or the love we have leaves us as time passes by. Perhaps it is not good-byes we hate. Perhaps good-byes, themselves, aren't painful at all. 'Cause maybe it is the loving that we hate but we never truly admit it. 'Cause maybe all along we knew, with loving comes good-byes, and that idea is what's painful.

Last night, before I close my eyes, my heart whispered me something. It told me to love you endlessly.

My lids finally shut as I lull myself to the thought,
           *"I will. And I always will."

Guilt slits slowly my throat. As I gurgle anxiety, it watches.

"Just **** me!" I imploringly screech.

"I can't," it retorts coldly.

"What do you mean you can't?! End this agony! Stab my throat! Pierce my heart. Let me bleed and let me die!"

Guilt stared then, calmly, with a sigh,
"You're the one holding the knife."

We could easily find ourselves falling in love for things unfamiliar. We think it's beautiful, our hearts taken away. But like travelers journeying to a new city, after some time, we get used to what it's like - not as pretty as we first arrived.

And it is in the nature of man to crave something beautiful and extraordinary, yet we still come back to where we have all began. To our home. Very familiar. Even uninteresting. But the solace it gives, no other place could cater. We come home bleary after toil - partly because of the stories we are to tell, and partly because we know it will always promptly accept us. It's the only place that whispers to our hearts, ever so gingerly inviting us to return. Patiently, patiently it waits for us to come back. To come home. Back to its arms, back to its warmth. Moreover, you long for it just as how you long for a lover's embrace - its security and reassurance.

*I may not be your only love through out future's time, but I wish I am your home.

I tried to stop it once, but I failed.
I tried to dry them once, but I failed.
Because of you, I greatly failed.
And no worse a failure can be than I.

I have failed to stop my pen from
       continually bleeding your name.
*And I failed to dry these pages,
       soaked in thoughts of you.

I think I'll forever long for your kiss like how the desert longs for rain.
And crave for your touch like how a wound demands pain.

I'll forever ache for your "I miss you", with the tumid wish for things to stay the same;
     like how, from then, each and every "I
            love you" would ache for your name.