If suffering is happiness
and tears are love
I am devotion itself
break me
I’ll pen thank you notes in blood

sometimes I picture you
on epic adventures
battling to save the world
maybe lost in time
with no battery or reception
fighting to get back home
to wrap me in your arms
and tell me all about it

it’s more comforting
dressing you up as a hero
shining and beautiful
charming and loving
as you always were
denying the reality
that you walked away
without looking back

Thanks, you said
For being an ally
You meant well
But I felt invisible

My marriage status
Plain, vanilla clothes
And natural appearance
Fueled your assumptions

This Pride month
Must I don rainbows
Or shave my head
To gain acceptance?

When will diversity
Be so universal
That I can truly be myself
Without being mislabeled?

Today I stopped to imagine

If hindsight were foresight,
love languages always matched,
and needs were always met

If we never hurt each other
or let each other down
and if distance, time or death couldn’t separate

If…
If only…

How rich and beautiful the tapestry of our connections would be

Oui, mon petit chou
Still I daydream of you
Sipping and writing

Not a day goes by
that I don’t wish
I could have been what you wanted.

I wasn’t Monogamy
or Hierarchy,
but I wasn’t casual either.

No, I loved you,
all of you, each of you,
with all that I was.

I shared secrets,
my dreams, my soul,
but with many.

It still hurts
knowing you loved an idea
when I loved you for you.

I die inside
remembering your pain
even if it was inevitable.

For no one
should have to pretend in love
or live a lie.

You were beautiful,
you still are,
our incompatibilities aside.

Forgive me, loves,
for loving in the plural
and breaking all our hearts.

I used to feel lost here
without a family or a purpose.
Five times I packed up to leave.

"The island won't let me go" -
my dramatic way to shift blame
from a lack of direction.

But...
I met you
and you
and you
and you
and you

This year-long journey became twenty
Now we all have a home in each other
If I am still lost, it is only in Love.