~Whenever I see you before you see me, and you're just living your life, I think you are the most beautiful, because you're not trying to impress me, you're just simply yourself~

I feel like a lab rat, like I’m being watched
And observed and my every move monitored.
Maybe even more so I feel like a puppet,
With different people pulling me this way and that,
Trying to get me to side with them or with her or with him.
Why can’t I decide for myself?
Or even better, how about you work it out
On your own?
Do I need to constantly be that friend who you
Talk to each other about behind their backs?
Do you think I want to be that friend who
Constantly has to choose between pleasing
You or the other?
Some days I feel like taffy, and you two are little kids
Baking in the kitchen,
Bickering about something that won’t matter in ten minutes.
You don’t realize the damage you do to the taffy
As you stretch it beyond recognition.
If you break the taffy,
Do you get a prize?

In the cold, dark
        of January,
         I remembered
              you
        the most.
  As the chill
      snapped bones
              like branches,
     as the afternoons
   bathed themselves
in gray,
     as the birds
and the backs
      shook,
so did my lips
   around your name.
I'm so happy
     January is almost
over now.

Please practice the art of giving up on giving up.