brick by brick.
piece by piece.

there was that night in the alleyway
when you confessed that you loved me
[the words pouring out of your mouth
like oil onto water]
and these words collided with my wall
dropping abruptly
to the ground
like the raindrops that were
falling from the heavens
onto our eyelashes.

day by day.
each by each.

it was that night in the alleyway
when you admitted you love me
and you see me
and you hear me
and you
know me.

and i know you.

it was that night when one of my
bricks toppled to the
ground, liberated by your
perfect imperfection.

we are insane, yes.
having known each other a
minuscule fraction of
a lifetime and wanting to
spend the rest of it with
one another.

but these bricks
[which were
lying heavy on my
sprightly soul]
were ****** to the ground,
emancipating me from my
encumbering wall
as you began to
pour into the spaces
where they once persisted.

you replace my opposition to
vulnerability with the kind of love
i have fervently yearned for,
craved and desired
night by night.
each by each.

the clock strikes 11:11,
it's always you i had wished for.
for now i know;
if you hope hard enough,
it works.

for a person like me
[a person like us]
letting this guard down
is almost as arduous as
quantum physics.
or advanced chemistry.
or seeing someone you love
in tears.

i feel that i am destined for you
so much so that i can
easily
imagine being this older couple
i once saw at the park,
holding hands and living like they
were still 21.
and i wished to God that i would
find that love.

dear God, i don’t even know
if i believe in you but...
thank you for
sending him to me.

he is it.
he is endgame.
there are some things that a
heart just knows. my god, i
feel him with me when i am alone,
[i can barely breathe without him]
and know that he should have been
holding my hand all along,
holding my all, all along.

he is my ultimate karmic
retribution.
[chapped lips,
countless kisses.]

never be scared, my dear.
never doubt my love.
for as you say you will never
leave me, it will be in my arms
that you will always stay.

there are just some things
a heart knows.

brick by brick
piece by piece
day by day
each by each
we will crush our
doubts and fears.
hesitations and tears.

i am madly, madly
irretrievably and
blissfully
in love with you.

my dear,
we are meant to be.
you are living,
breathing poetry.

what lips my lips have kissed,
and where,
and why;
i know not why.

what arms have held me,
and how tightly,
and how rightly;
i know not why.

he was my friend
of all friends, but
it was futile to be
just friends.
so, i
let him have me,
all of me.
nothing shatters you
like a first love.

he gets all of you,
drags away these
shards of you
that stick in his memory,
of that desperate girl who
only wanted to be loved by him.
but could not trust him,
and rightly so.

for when he has grown sick
of you,
and that girl at the party
was simply easier to be with - -
more vanilla,
less rocky road,
and he never really
loved you at
all --
something is killed
inside of you.

[but i know you did love me and i
know you still think about me,
like i still write about you.]

he was my friend but
we had never been together
alone. i knew that
he wanted all of me.
and i wanted all of him.
yet, i held him,
his body trembling
in my arms,
and he was still too in love
with that other girl
to take advantage
of me.
[he loved this girl that
made him move to the states,
that lived with him and loved him,
and then loved another
and then slept, soundly, next to him
in the darkness.]

i had just met him
and just kissed him
and just fell too fast for this
fast-moving man.
we strolled along the
charles, and he told me i was
beautiful and gave me a flower
like they do in those
idiotic romantic comedies
that we all can’t help but love.
and when he kissed me on
the bridge - -
grabbed my wrist and
****** me into his
lips - -
the city lights
illuminated our
fervent faces,
and then i let him have
most of me,
and at that hollywood moment
i forgot that
men will do these things.
and leave you naked in the night.
and say they’ll call.
[they never do.]

he was just a
flat out
mistake.
there was nothing
poetic
about us.
i do always strive,
in living,
for pure poetry.

three days later,
he was another mistake.
he kissed me and i forced
the passion because i just
wanted to be close to someone
and he was there, and it was easy,
and i never should have asked
him to be with me
that night. i know that
now.

and so, the girl i had been
so long ago
no longer exists.
and thus, i feign my
demeanor,
my kindness to
strangers.
it's simply affectation.
because, from what i’ve
ascertained
in my exceedingly dramatic life,
most people are ****.
no, seriously.
most people
are ****.

and so, why bother with recounting
what loves have come and gone,
for my innocence   is   now gone.
summer sang in me for a short while,
and these flames extinguished
its voice.

he was exactly like my first love.
an *******.
hilarious, gorgeous,
but an ******* as it was.
and still, i let him have
most of me,
and feigned my amicable demeanor,
and spent the day with him.
and when he left i cried
because i knew what this
had meant nothing to
either of us, and it was
finally
getting to me.

for the next few months
i convinced myself that i could be
alone, that being with someone,
really being with them
would simply
dim the unrestrained sparks inside of me.
thus i realize i stand frozen in the snow - -
in winter stands the lonely tree, which is me.
and i apprehend that the ***** i give
vanish one by one.
and i apprehend that my heart
boughs more silent than ever before.

that is,
until he asks me to grab
a drink or two,
and stay the night at my
place, and says
he's looking for something
casual, at first.
and ***.
and if we were compatible,
he is o p e n
for a relationship.
and i let him have
most of me that
night. and we had
a stressless
non-relationship
for a while.
that is,
until i wanted him
to stay longer than an hour
[which even the *******
deign to do]
and at the drop
of a hat, in his eyes,
i’mattached.

well maybe i am.
but he will
never know that.
because he doesn’t want

me.
nor does he care about
the person, the woman, who inhabits
the body he has been exploiting.
he is the very opposite of poetry.
he   is    prose.
he  is   a    box
who  does not
want   to    get
attached      to
me     because
he    is  scared
as    all     hell
that      maybe
i    could    be
the     one   to
turn his prose into
a free verse, to open up his
life to love, but instead
he closeshimselfup
to me, to the notion,
hibernating in his
lovely shell.

the air  is  awash of  ghosts
tonight who  tap  and sigh,
who      long       to       take
back     the      body     they
so   readily   seized   when
it was open for them.  they
await my reply.  but in my
heart  remains a quiet pain
for   all  of  these  lads who
will         remain           now
unremembered   and  who  
will  no longer  turn  to me
at  midnight   with   a    cry,
convinced  my disguise  is
who i am.

[what they know won’t
hurt them.
but it absolutely will
hurt me.]

Fred occupies his chair, innocently enough.
Occupying his time by
Solving the crossword puzzle, racking his brain
for the answers.
So all of the letters fit together.
So every space is filled. The beauty of solved Enigmas.
Ten across. Opposite of faithfulness.
The fire consumes the logs. Contained Chaos.
The room is illuminated in frantic light
Emanating from the fireplace.
Flames prevented from yielding to their Natural


Yearning to Disseminate to whatever matter
Will accept them. Fred sits on his chair,
Innocently enough,
But if you look in those
Eyes of his, you will witness the Beauty of
Pain, la Douleur exquise d'amour.
Loving Someone he will, invariably, love and forgive.

A woman

Whose love has changed patterns. Changed
Directions. Altered. There is a string
That hitches his heart to that of his infidel.
His wife. He feels foreign blood impairing
Them. He knows her. Without her telling
Him anything, he knows the Lies in those
Eyes of her. Confirming his knowledge.
Ten across. Infidelity. Means unfaithful.


She walked in moments ago, sat on the
Usual chair in front of him. Fred’s
Heart aches now with the immensity of the
Heartache within his wife.
He feels her heart has been broken
By the same man who usurped her from
Him every Thursday. She would return

[not quite yet]

Home on those days, Disjointed, Distracted. He
Knew this was what Falling in
Love looked like. But today, his wife's
Heart feels different. Her Lover is
Absent from their blood. Fred no
Longer is
Obligated to pump the blood of his
Wife’s flame throughout his own body.


and yet, he feels sorry for her.
feels her suffering.
feels her pain more than his own.


He watches her face, the Sorrow in
Her eyes drinks the flames of the
Fire. Fred can tell she wishes she were


In the flames. Better yet, the
Blaze itself, free from her despondency,
The places her mind must be traveling to.
Fred is fully aware that she is contemplating
Unloading her triste to him. Not for
His own Benefit, to be Honest with him.
Only to assuage her Guilt, to
empty her conscience of
Bad Blood.


She is a sinner. She will sin
Again. No doubt about that. But.
His Infidel.
He cannot stand to see her...
His love...his life...


If someone is spread out before you
Seeking to surrender to Death,
You do not Simply let them die.
Especially if they share half your blood.
Especially if your Happiness is
Contingent upon their survival.


Fred’s wife has a ghostly look on her
Face and he cannot help but save her from
Her caustic thoughts, from the
Consuming pain in her very
Core.


and so he guides
her back to him.
just her wide eyes.
he knows all.

And He forgives her.

The pervasive silence fills my ears, the resonance of it inundates me. I speculate what you’re thinking about, why you are now drifting into nothingness, why we are now on the precipice of nothingness. Maybe I revealed too much, perhaps I shouldn’t have told you that you are what I want, that you will always be what I want...that this will never change. My feelings for you are constant, they never waver. They bubble over into hysteria, into rash thoughts, into frantically telling you these things. Things that make your lips still. My lips are still too. They are meant to kiss you with, my dear. They are meant to break the absolute fragility of this silence, the glass house that we currently inhabit. Words right now would be like stones, carelessly thrown. I am living in the reality I have created in my mind. I do not know what to accept as fact or fantasy, for your silence deafens me,  your silence stops me from being able to rationalize my own reality. For I will never know what gears are shifting in your machine of a mind. For I will never know whether this silence is meaningful to you, whether you know the speed at which my spry thoughts are sailing. You could be thinking about how unreal the sun feels on your back after the months of winter we have endured. You could not be thinking about me. Or maybe you want to admit to me that we occupy the same reality, you and I...Or maybe you’re plotting your inescapable escape. This silence will be misconstrued in infinite ways, overanalyzed, thought about incessantly until my mind becomes overcome with you. Until my mind tires of you. Until I force you away from me. Until my feelings are fleeting, and you wonder what I am thinking when I thoughtlessly wander away from you, abandon you...leaving you standing there with your own thoughts, your own mind. Your own reality.

you tread over my heart
like a heavy foot to the ground.
like a man stranded in the sea
using all of his strength to
keep his head above the water.

i try and try,
and try...
yet to no avail.
i am of
no concern
to you.
at all.

you don’t
know how
your disregard
confounds me,
for my feelings
remain
unknown to you.

[only so you don’t
give up on me
completely.]

respect is
indispensable.
without it,
who are we?
we must
cherish love.
[a homeless man
cherishes
every cent he earns.]

but,
we are cavemen
without the
common decency
to be considerate
to each other’s
hearts.
but, we are
savages
without the
knowledge that
our actions
completely
and utterly
transform
others.
but, we are
insects that
eat their mates
after they
copulate.

*** means less to us
than it does to that lowly spider
spinning his gossamer thread
in that corner, there.

our bodies are
empty shells
filled with
could
have been’s...
should
have been’s...
would
have been’s...
these feelings are
obsolete.

looking me
straight in the eye,
without hesitation,
you say
not only
don’t you love me,
but
you never once
have
and never once
will.

you just
wanted my
listless
corpse of a body
to do with as you
please.
to seize it
blindly and wholly
to use it
as if it were
your right.
as if you’re
entitled.

you took advantage of my weakness,
for passion and for you.
you managed to trick my mind.
doing magic tricks with your eyes.
casting spells on me with your hands.
holding me as if you always would.

[not only
for the night.]

death is simply the
absence of life.
but life cannot be the
converse. life cannot be
absence of death,
for death lurks around the
corner, death thrives
inside us all. every breath, the
last we may take. every
blink, the
last we may see the light.

for when i walk down the
street, whenever i cross a
busy intersection, i heed the
grin of death in the confines of
my mind. this cheshire cat smile, the
bane of my existence...
end of my existence. the
car that is whizzing by could
hit me, whisking me away, the
plastic bag caught in the wind,
dandelion seeds blown off the
stem of a **** by an innocent child.

[she doesn’t yet know her own mortality.]

i was that girl once, playing with the
boy from next door,
without the
crushing reality
that i could slip, hit my head on the
boulder on my lawn
and end my life, just like i ended the
lives of that colony of ants i
thoughtlessly massacred earlier.

and what about the
sinister knife i hold in the kitchen?
what about the
infinite pills in my drawer?
what about the
precipitous stairs in my apartment?
how easy it is to end the
life i have spent so long
cultivating, constructing; the
meaningless hours i have spent
doing things that make me long to
abstain from life and feign death in the
only place that makes death appear to be
the favorable option.

death lingers in the shadows.
it is the one thing i am certain of
in life.

if you wanted the sky,
clouds, overwhelming blue,
i would harness it
and give it to you.
if you wanted the sun,
self-perpetuating, vast ball of flame,
i would gather it
and give it to you.
if you wanted my heart,
the thing that keeps me alive, ****** fist,
i would rip it out of my chest
and give it to you
wrapped up
with a bow.

all of these things i would give,
without resignation about
how life would be
for others
without a sky,
without a sun to keep them warm...
or how i would function
without my heart.

[with my heart
in your greedy
hands.]

you would take all of this from me,
without shame, without guilt,
selfishly and ignorantly,
believing that i’ve given
all of this to you
because you are
somehow
entitled
to it.

but i won’t blame you for
accepting my gifts.
after all, i am the one
who now gives them to you.

i am the one who rips the sun
out of the sky,
who then takes that sky
scoops it into a bucket
and delivers it to you
without a second thought.

i am the reason why my chest is
completely open,
why i am bleeding out now.
i am the one who granted you
my heart.

i cannot condemn you for taking it.

She strides down the street,
Holds that cancer stick up to her mouth,
Takes a deep breath in,
Filling her lungs with lethal smoke,
Gradually rotting away her
Interior.

Her heart beats out of her chest.
[A heart divided between two hearts.]

He’s waiting at the street corner
Between the alley of lust and the
Path of ignorance.
She sees his silhouette in the
Distance, a dark apparition.
Her heart leaps out of her chest,
Towards him,
Reaching for him,
Propelling her to him.

She had absolutely no control over the matter.

The other man she loves is home
Alone, waiting for her too.
Moments ago, he
Held her in his arms,
Kissed her goodbye,
Told her to hurry back soon.
“I love you.”
“I love you, too” - the words
Suddenly conveyed
No meaning to her.
She told him she was
Running an errand, when,
In reality,
She was running away
From him.

[A heart divided between two hearts
Can never really be a heart.]

His love suffocates her.
His love drowns her
In its constancy,
In its predictability.
With him, she feels like a
Bird with its wings ripped off.
Held captive, in a wire cage.

[A heart divided between two hearts
Can never beat the way it should.]

How can a woman with two men
Who love her
Feel so
Staggeringly
Alone?
Who will love her until their
Disintegrating hearts turn into
Simply dust.

[A heart divided between two hearts
Can never really keep from rupturing,
Infecting the body with its own poisons.]

So she lets her underground lover
Envelop her in his arms
And kiss her until both of their lips
Are numb,
Until they both want more.
Until they cannot restrain themselves.

His love releases her out of her
Cage, allows her to fly once again.
The passion of these moments
Will never be forgotten.
His love brings the roses back to
Her lifeless cheeks, brings life
Back to the void inside her.

And, his love allows her
To fly back home, once again,
Straight into the arms of the
Man who is her keeper.

The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Faces without name, faces without purpose
Faces that are just like my own.
I watch the decrepit, old man
Standing, waiting for a train to nowhere
Wandering through the rest of his days
Like every second
Is his
Last.

The children playing there don’t know it yet.
Soon they will -- their weary mothers do.
Every day, growing older.
Every day, growing colder.
Every day, realizing our fate.

The tracks are wet from the cold,
Unfeeling rain.
The rain, which pours from the
Infinite sky,
[Of which we will all soon belong]
Floods the streets and earth
[Of which we will all soon belong]
The drops dismantle the delicate flowers surrounding us...

Petals
                Drop
                              To
                                        The
                                                   Ground
helpless.

Our days dwindle as such.

One day
We will all be these
Petals on a wet, black bough.

it is a sea of leaves -- a deep, bottomless, sea of leaves.
you can get lost in there, you know.
lost like an abandoned child in a city of strangers
and lost
like when you drive and drive and drive
aimlessly, mad, senseless,
when your only intent is to get lost and be lost.

but
this sea of leaves
[yes, this vast ocean of leaves on leaves on leaves]
this is myself only on the best of days.
my mind cannot and will not ever find itself.
sanity had been abandoned years before
when i came to the realization that
nothing really matters
too much.

and now i am autumn when all of the leaves fall down --
unordered, hysterical,
all of the time changing
all of the time varying
never the same as a moment before.
beautiful, but knowing
that beauty is impermanent.

soon i will be like the tree branches
when the leaves have abandoned them.
stark, empty, cold.
naked, with all of my flaws displayed to the world
[with all of my life on the ground.]
and i will still be lost.
and so incredibly lost in my mind.
lost.

so let me dive into this deep sea of leaves,
'cause lord knows it is better than being found.

there is a monster beneath
the lofty, billowing sheets of my bed
beneath the mattress
the box spring
the carefully crafted wooden frame.

[he lives in the shadows,
in the obscurity there.]

i should feel sheltered...safe,
underneath these sheets,
[like my mother’s arms
tucking me in tight,
don’t let the bed bugs bite.]

but when my arm dangles off my bed,
when i commit that fatal mistake,
i feel a draw to the ground
more forceful than the force of gravity
seizing my hand
paining to pull me under.
and i know it is the monster.
i feel his yearning
for the blood and guts of a child...
his desire to rip me apart
like a lion does his prey.

i take back control of my hand,
wrap my arms around myself,
feigning safety.
for as we all know
that monster could very well
clamber, creep out
climb onto my bed
and swallow me whole.

i don’t know why he hasn’t yet --
perhaps he likes the challenge
of waiting for me
to be susceptible enough to
forget myself
and leave my arm suspended
for more than
just a moment.

i am curled up into a fetal position
paralyzed by my fear.
the anxiety invades my joints
so that i cannot move anymore.
i fall into a fitful sleep
and wake up to sunshine radiating
through my window,
casting the intricate patterns of
my curtains on the rug.

during the day,
the monster cannot survive.
but when nighttime falls
the darkness returns,
my trepidation returns
and the monster is alive.
well, again.

[I can only survive my life in two ways;
wasted by the fire of my gratification,

wasted by the fire of my longing.]

Love had just woven my

intolerable shirt of flame, this

bedazzled blouse betwixt 

an area brimming with smoke

and my own heart.



this consuming flame...

the flame that fuels itself with

my everything.



I am a sorceress at the stake.

I feel the fire sear
into my skin,

destroying the weak,
frail covering 
to my body,

disseminating to parts

I didn’t know
existed.



The torment is utterly
consuming.



Everything within me,
every ounce of strength
that remains, struggles to

shed this shirt of flame.

[This devised torment

by love Herself.]


Yet, the blazing fire

is frantic for my body.

The flames

cling to me,
fast to my skin,

like you have

...and do

...and will.


We suspire the smoke from the flames which
destroy all that surrounds us;

it becomes a part of us that

our bodies will never be able
to discern...
to notice...

to erase.

And I recall that when I first l laid my eyes upon him, I knew that he was the one for me. I think he knew too. It was the power of the look we exchanged, the magnetism of it, the electricity, the immense power of the force of attraction. He had something in him that was irresistible and that something drew me to him like a moth to a flame. My heart sunk into the deep confines of my body, my eyes were ravenous for him, my body yearned for him. As if the world had suddenly ceased to exist, as if nothing else mattered in the world and all I wanted was to be with you and know you inside and out, know you better than you know yourself. Love at first sight does not exist, it is impossible to come to love a man at first glance, to understand him, to trust him. It is possible to be infatuated with him. It is possible to be consumed with his face, his nose, his eyes...to be in lust at first sight. But this lust grows, yes this lust swells into love and my life is empty without you here and my heart needs you to pump the blood through my veins and my brain needs you to tell me how to speak again and my hand needs you to be here to firmly hold it. A seed was planted with that first look and was watered with words and touches, and the seed grew to be the size of the universe plus everything in it and more than that. We are on fire and our sparks fuel the flames.

Just Let It In

this
language,

the perplexity 

of this language, 

is damaging to me.

how can there possibly

exist such an impeccably

imposing combination of

words that still manage to destroy 

a soul as wasted as mine? somehow 

words discover these fine little cracks in 

my wall, as thin as the head of a pin. words 

are like water, rushing into whatever space they 

can invade, occupying whatever volume they discover. 

this water trickles through the fragmented spaces, traveling

all the way to my heart, transforming me in the way they seem to

alter us all. it is these words that i take with me. words reverberate in my mind,

disrupt me to my core, degrade me. your  words are the ones i perpetually carry with me...

any...all of them. yours are the ones that elicit the simultaneous firing of every
single neuron in my brain. there is something about the magic of your words
flowing together...whispered into my ear. they move through me like
a stealthy, lone snake, undulating in a field, stalking its defenseless
prey; slowly...at first glance, not appearing to be a perilous threat
...then piercing me all at once with fierce strength and
determination, devouring me without appearing to 

acknowledge that maybe i still...still want to be.

to be whole. and i do. my body craves 

the sensation of being complete,
not torn apart by the nonsense
of your  daunting words
disrupting my spirit
and making me
despise the
necessity
of language.

i wish i could
void your words 

from my brain, but
my mind is helplessly
inconsistent; i can never
forget what i long to,  
scarcely remember
what i must; and
my peculiar mind
*
certainly* will never
forget the sound
of your words, 

just like water,

flooding me.

taking me

over.

this door exists,
stately and staunchly it stands,
disheartening and terrifying it remains.
the door is unlocked, yet cannot be opened,
for in it, a path in time...
one decision that can affect everything
[such as my choice to wear the necklace you adore,
which lead to you noticing me for the very first time,
or my idea to play you the song that you fell in love with,
which i can no longer listen to]
...for in this door, one path
is intimidatingly located.

every bone in my body,
every last muscle, tendon, ligament
each artery, each vein, each capillary
every single nerve,
even each microscopic cell,
implores me not to open this tempting door...

[it is almost as if my hand refuses to grasp the handle,
to unleash the unknown upon me,
the colossal chain of events that would ensue]

the immensity of the unfamiliar,
the unexplored,
tends to perturb me.
change is unnerving
and is almost as chilling
as an abandoned graveyard at midnight.

but i bring my mind back to the door,
yes! this preposterous door that i have contrived for myself.
why is the **** so easily turned?
why does it not put up somewhat of a fight,
at least jolt me suddenly,
as to frighten my curious heart?
it is a constant battle between my body
my mind
and my heart
as to which doors to open
and which ones to leave ever so steadfastly closed.
but never once has there been such a struggle
for them to reach an understanding.

somehow my heart,
[even though a fraction of me,
a fist, dripping in blood]
is prevailing for the moment.
my heart reaches for the handle,
attempts to unclose the door...
yet, with the best of its ability,
withstanding my strong-willed
and obstinate heart,
my powerful body and commanding mind
overcome this hostile takeover,
and the door remains shut.

it is my body,
my skillful mouth,
my soft, rose lips,
my elegant tongue,
and my vocal chords...
all of these pieces must
contrive the words,
conceive the change,
which will unveil the path that will forever alter us...

slowly, opening the door.

being as in love with you as i am,
i will not let you slip away from my arms right now.
but when we are not together
[i wish you’d have been there,
i needed you there]
i stare at this humbling door.

if i wait too long, i’ll forever lose you;
for it is you who will make this choice for me,
opening your own door, fearless and dauntless.

from the mind of an anxious depressive

from the time i, as a little girl,
dressed up like a princess
[tiara and all,
pouffy, pink dress and all]
listened to my mother tell me
a fairy tale
of a woman who finds
her prince charming,
and is rescued by him,
and lives happily, happily ever after
in a magnificent palace by the sea…
and i, as a brooding teenager,
insecure and reclusive,
observed a
[now viewed as ridiculous]
romantic film
about a woman who finds her
one true Love,
and he rescues her,
and they live happily, happily ever after
in a beautiful three-bedroom home
where they raise two,
perfect children…
and i, as a young woman,
fully aware and adept,
recognizing the world for what it is
as *i see it,
seeing love dismantle time,
and time again....

i am fully aware that nothing can possibly last for a happily ever after.

the doubt is consuming,
the wall is well-built and
unyielding.
my heart remains too crippled
to possibly endure the grief that
falling in Love elicits.

but,
Love finds you even if you have
given up the notion of it.
it gallops in on its white horse.
has bright blue eyes.
sparks a smile that can illuminate
my somber heart.
has no regard for my opposition to itself.
is selfish and greedy and exhausting.

it is utterly impossible to avoid
being seduced
into the black hole
from which i will never leave
precisely the same.
from which i will surrender
a piece of myself
essential to my functioning.

Love sweeps in like a tornado
[destroying everything in its path]
and so the five stages of falling in Love,
and falling apart,
begin.

denial.
i feign disinterest.
i pretend as if he doesn’t
engross my thoughts
as if my heart doesn’t encroach upon my stomach
when he enters the room.
if asked by a friend,
“why does your face turn bright red
when he dares to utter your name?”
i pretend like she is the insane one
[when i am the one denying my heart.]

anger.
i become enraged.
Love has taken control.
the knowledge that i let Love
dismantle the wall,
that i have spent years building,
and reinforcing,
[brick by brick, piece by piece]
infuriates me.
i let him gradually demolish it.
and now i am powerless and susceptible,
and now he has me by the heartstrings.
he holds me in his greedy palms.

bargaining.
i avoid the fact that i am falling,
yes, i am falling.
oh, so deeply for him.
i watch myself fall from such great heights
straight into the ground
crashing through to the
center of
the world.
i even pray to God,
the one i'm not even sure i believe in.
i tell Him that i would do anything,
anything just to take back control.
to have two firm hands on the wheel.
to be the driver
instead of the passenger.

depression.
i cannot bring myself
to shove off the covers.
to crawl out of bed.
i am miserable and helpless and
he is all i can think about.
he is my first thought
when i am awake.
my last when my mind
finally tires of him,
and i fall into a
fitful night of sleep.
yet, i do not tell him any of this.
he wonders why i am so distant,
so removed from him.
what he does not know is that
he carries part of myself with him
wherever he goes.

acceptance.
when my nerves have finally worn themselves down,
when my heart has reached an understanding with my mind,
when Love does not appear as something to be grieved,
that is when i fall in Love.

never once have i
accepted Love from a man,
Love that could alter
my melancholy mind,
nor have i trusted a man with my heart.
[although i have been forced by Love itself to relinquish it.]

i have been obstinate and headstrong
and refused to give all of myself
in fear of losing myself.
but maybe one day, i will be
rescued from myself.