Well, I know
I thought about cold toes on linoleum
Insincere notes on a podium
Loving them after you scolded them
Sent to bed but still on wooden steps
Telling stories of policies left unsaid
The qualities of bread

Diaphragm stretched
Still nothing I could say
Enraged, I threw the bottom shelves out
To make the hiccups go away

will you build a tower in my name
will every step to the top sing to you
will every broken window pane
invite chills down your spine
will you feel the rotten wooden handrail
and brush the cobwebs from the corners
will you see the stars when you arrive
will your eyes meet the ground
will you build a tower in my name

live in it
with it
inside it

I love you in moments unnoticed
In the spaces between words
Eyes looking upward in thought
In the breaths between stories

I love you in places unknown
In the cracks on the floorboards
Tucked away in corners of the attic
In the shutters on the windowsill

I love you in time undiscovered
In memories lying dormant
Craving to awaken
In the heartbeat of life

Where others love in shouts, I love in whispers
that only we can feel
Face to face
Eye to eye
And in loving you
By sun and moon
My love grows louder by color

I left you
Left you lying on a bed
Cuddled up with our memories.
I left you to go cry
To rock myself to sleep
Clutching our memories.
I left you
I left you whole, yet I was shattered
Broken pieces of self doubt and insecurity.
I left you to go put myself back together,
To try and regain my dignity
To try and feel happy
I left you to try and figure out
how you can both leave me feeling so good
And also so lost.
I left you because you don't want me
Because I can't continue to want you
And I can't continue to care, when you dont.
I left you because I am chasing a ghost
Running after someone that never started the race.
I left you because I knew you'd let me
Let me run out the door,
Drunk as I was, sad as I was, lonely and playing second fiddle as I was.
I left you because your pity makes me sick
Am I as pathetic as I appear?
I left you because I knew you wouldn't call,
I knew you wouldn't text to see if I was ok.
I left because sleep was more important
To you then my slowly breaking heart and mind.
I left you because I am too dramatic
and even still I know this is my fault,
That this played out the way I knew it would.
I left you because I cannot leave myself.