You waited for me,
So I wait for you.

I wait for you to text,
I wait for you to call,
I wait for you to love me.

You made promises,
Beautiful dreams
And I wait for them to come true.

You say it will get better,
That everything will change,
So I wait for your words to become reality.

I wait for you to come home,
Where I wait for more bad news
And more promises.

I wait alone,
Becoming more and more hopeless
That your words will ever be
Anything but words.

I keeping waiting
I keep pleading
Now all I want is the truth.

I wait for you to decide
I wait for you to let go
Or just tell me that you won't.

I wait for you to answer me,
Knowing that you won't
So I can stop waiting
For your love to come home.

In the silence,
It's my turn to decide.
I decide i've been too patient,
You've wasted my time.

And yet somehow,
I still wait for you to care.
I still hope you'll prove me wrong.

Because love is patient,
And love is all I have for you.

So you take my time,
Hour by hour,
Day by day,
I wait.

Maybe I'm waiting for something
That I will never get back,
The way you used to care.

Maybe I'll take this clock I keep checking
All the way to my grave.

From under the dirt,
My heart will keep counting the seconds,
Keep waiting for your love.

I'd give you every second
Of the time I have left,
But it wouldn't mean a thing to you.

To you, my time is free.
To you, my patience has no value
Because it is all that you know.

It cannot be taken for granted,
Because it is granted unconditionally.
Whether you want it or not.

So I wait,
As the clock keeps ticking,
For my heart to finally stop.

Maybe when my time is up,
It will finally mean something to you.

The space you take in me
Stretches to every border of my landscape.

It leaves little terrain
For any other notion to take root.

Your wilderness is dense,
Filled with sharp-toothed creatures
And poison fruit.

It is invasive,
Spreading without challenge
Or consideration for the native species.

I wouldn’t mind your expansive occupation,
Had you ruled with benevolence.

But your presence is oppressive.
It leaves me cowering with fear
In the dark corners of your territory.

Now I think a revolution of the heart
Is about to ignite.
The resistance is growing
And torches are lit.

There is time to save yourself,
Time to quell the riots.
But it’s clear that you lack the will,
The mercy to change.

So now you must burn.
Every branch,
Every leaf,
Will be reduced to ash.

I will reclaim what is mine
Like I have done so many times before.
And your claim to my heart
Will go up in smoke.

Desire overcomes me again,
Impulse stronger than my resolve in love.
Need to be close to someone for tonight.
Touch me, pretend I’m still alive.
Feeling has eluded me for too long now.

Stupid heart, letting go just as easily as it binds.
Drunk and still drinking, I let it go too far.
Thoughtless, or so it seems, but I never have been.
Quickly, I say too much, before I get the chance to stop.
Just once, only tonight, I let myself fall.

Quiet now, let’s keep this to ourselves.
Confused and only getting worse.
Apologies, over and over, this isn’t what you wanted.
Sincerity is lost in my empty brain.
Foggy judgement, as usual, I’m slipping again.

Unsure of my own motivations.
Questions linger unanswered, unconsidered.
Stories I tell myself to stay sane.
Lies I tell myself to keep my feet on the ground.
Hope that it all just goes away.

Just come home already.

My too-big clothes pile into mountains
At the foot of my bed.

I pull my belt tighter,
But loose fabric swims around my thighs.

Joy, love, control over both the internal and external
Melts away from me and forms puddles at my feet.

Looking down into the pool,
I see a child with loneliness strewn about her face.

She begs to be known,
But my impulse is to turn away from her.

To think the fear of loss, of abandonment
Has pushed me to abandon myself...

I cannot reach into that stagnant pond
To hold her.

I cannot keep putting my hands down my throat,
Hoping that she comes spilling out.

And were she to appear,
I'm not convinced I would have the strength to hold her.

But I lay siege to my body anyway,
Longing to starve out this parasite.

Hoping to leave nothing behind,
So that reflections can no longer torture me with desperate eyes.

Because absence, lack, nothingness
Has no countenance for mirrors or puddle-surfaces to display.

An empty space cannot hurt me,
Not like a blank page can.

I feel it radiating in my finger tips
While a terror-stricken quiver
Turns in my stomach
And ascends to my throat
Until dread comes coursing out of my mouth
And shame soaks my cheeks.

Sometimes it seems
That I’m made of glass
And the resonant frequency
Of my foreboding observations
Is enough to make me fracture,
Sending broken pieces flying.

Now, my love I hope you know
That I’m doing everything in my power
To keep all my pieces together.
But doctors, pills, paintbrushes, and extra employment
Are not a substitute for your love.

It’s absence leaves a crack in my foundation
That nothing else can repair.
It’s shape, it’s depth
Are as exceptional as you.
So what crawls out of that cavern
Is a monster of seclusion,
Come to torture me with worry.

I had hoped that your love could reach me
From an ocean away.
I hoped that the fissure would not form,
And your love would not follow you
Across the sea.
But it has
And I’m splintering into ugly, pathetic pieces.

I know I require more than most,
But I know that what I require exists out there
In someone eager to give it,
Joyfully, lovingly.
You promised to be that someone
But your promises take no shape
Except for in the letters
From which they are spelled.

So I will not keep begging for your love,
I will not keep letting your insufficient affection
Lead me to the edge of delirium.
I will not continue to weep
Over the inconsideration you have given me.

I know that what I require is out there
Bursting from someone
Who cannot help but to love me
In exactly the way I need to be loved.

From the corner of my eye,
I watched.
I noticed the way you lean in your chair,
The way you laugh like a storm in a drought.

Tilting your head back just enough,
Your bottom jaw protrudes,
Displaying your sharp chin.
You grin wide like the skies parting,
And closing your eyes,
Your shoulders shake like thunder.
You rain in drops of iridescence
That douse the fires in my arid attentiveness.

At the dawn of our day,
When I first began to know you,
Drinking too much,
Smiling at our fitful hands,
You carved out a piece of my being
And interred it within yourself.

This is not a complaint though.
I would give you every ounce of me,
Carved into whatever shapes suit your desires,
Whittling away at myself
With all the craftsmanship of Donatello.

With this piece,
You possess me completely
Everywhere you go.
Now you stretch my love across oceans
And my heart sets sail
In pilgrimage of you.

I’d drink every drop in the sea
And walk on its barren floor
To be close to you again.
I’d build a bridge of river-foraged driftwood
From my door to yours
Just to wrap my arms around you
For a moment or two.

But my body is already too saturated
With the sodden lamentations of missing you.
And I fear that I’m too weak with hunger
To carry all the branches and boards
Needed to raise such a structure.

So I will wait for you to come home.
And I wish I could say “patiently,”
But I’m fervent with longing
And frantic with grief.

But I will do my best to carry on.
I will paint, and smoke, and work, and cry
Until you’re home again.
Then I will hold you
And hold you and hold you and hold you,
Until we are stuck as one body
And you cannot escape again.

I wish I could believe you,
But I worry that sincerity cannot cross oceans.
And you can’t pack it up,
And send it home to me.

I wish I could keep my cheeks dry,
But I’m withering and wilting
And my eyes insist on self-watering.

I wish I knew how to tell you
That my lungs are stuck in my throat
And my eyes are swollen and sore,
Without it sounding like an accusation.

I wish that your absence
Wasn’t accompanied by heartache,
But I feel sick with desperation.

I wish you needed me
Even half as much as I need you,
But I’m as indispensable as an inkless pen.

I wish that my suffering
Mattered more to you than this expedition,
But I suppose that my suffering is steadfast
And no longer notable.

I wish you’d come home
I wish you’d never left
I wish you’d never leave again.