Of the two lamps in the room,
my glassy eyes can only tolerate the dimmed glow
of the lower light from the right,
my face basking in the slowly rotating,
barely blowing air from the fan above me.
My face feels flushed,
but not from the semi-sticky early summer heat,
but from the fact that
every time I come back to this room,
I'm reminded of why I left.

The lawyer in me could generate a list,
pros longer than any construction of cons,
yet your name will always reverberate
in the unforgotten corners of my subconscious.

You never loved me like I did you,
and even my romanticized version of you never
saw me the way I
still feel the ghost of you.

I can still feel the crisp fall air from your balcony
and recall the albums and conversations that
complete the track list
of my unrequited love story.

Sometimes it was real,
sometimes it's real,
sometimes it's a dream,
sometimes it's a memory.

And this is the essence of you and me;
it's more questions than answers,
smoke and mirrors and
smoking to make things clearer.

I've never been the same
since you,
but I also don't know how I can ever
get over someone I never really had.

You were mine in microcosms
that were macro extraterrestrial galactic;

was it real?
were we real or
was it all [science] fiction?

They say that time heals all
but time has come and
gone
and come and gone again
and I'm still raw,
unstitched,
not even scarred,
let alone healed.

If I close my eyes,
my body transports so easily to
the times and spaces we shared
and the times and spaces where
I waited for you,
for a response,
for you to appear,
for you to even give me a single
solitary
syllable,
but even that was too much.

The hands of clocks have grayed into
a new generation
and still whenever I take two steps toward
something better that voice of your
nothings tells me
I'm not enough
I'm not ready
I need more of things I can't even
identify.

The more I know myself
the more I question why
I was never enough for you,
and I wonder if me 2.0
still wouldn't be enough for
whichever version of you that's been
installed.
Would you know me now?
Do I know you now?
Am I still not enough?
Is that what I'm striving for?

The door is closed,
but the doubt
is always
o p e n
for debate.

I tasted a lingering shot of ****** *****
on my tongue
before my mouth tasted
the rest of the night.
I pretended that I was
much drunker than I was
because I thought that would
make it easier,
less painful.
I gave myself a pep talk
and should've understood
that nothing wanted
needs convincing.
I've suppressed the act so much
in my subconscious
that I only remember it in flashes,
like a slow motion replay of a life-ending
car accident you'd see in a movie.
In some ways,
that scened ended me;
the world was fuzzier
than it had been the night before,
when I woke up no longer wearing
my agency.
The normalcy with which I picked myself up
from the dingy navy couch
was underwhelming
and haunting all at once.
I left with my dress and my shame clinging to me,
fearing not for myself
or how I had said no so many times before,
but instead that
giving it all still wasn't enough for you;
losing myself,
unraveling my soul wasn't worth
what I thought it would sell for.
All I saw was
the satisfaction that I had given that didn't satisfy you.

An emptied shell;
you took it all,
and I've been hollow ever since.

I still can feel it when I close my eyes.

When I sleep, I am
trapped in a translucent space
where memories meet nightmares,
and it always lingers when
I wake.

The shame burns my insides
worse than any anger could
because even the nightmare
version ofyou
still gaslights me.

I have spent years building a persona
that projects strength so that
I can convince everyone
I would never have let that happen to me.

I am still trying to convince myself
because it's too painful.

Abuse is a ***** word and the others
that follow feel
       even
                dirtier than what
                                         you did to me.

I feel complicit.
I'm a co-conspirator in my own worst
living memory nightmares.

I was weak.
I said yes when I wanted to say no.
I gave in
      again and
                again and
                            again.

If my nightmares were a scene from a movie,
I would, on split screen, have
grabbed my own hand
and tugged myself into my own
horror, "it'll be okay, Meghan."
My subconscious is unrelenting,
unforgiving,
incomprehensible, undeniable
            you are a
    [stupiduglyworthlessspineless]
                        vict­imscratch that
                 survivorscratch that
       human ^tortured
         by            yourselfscratch that
                               him.
Ididthistomyselfscratch that
                                                      He did this to me.

I stare blankly at the
bathroom wall
where the tiled portion
meets the faded blue paint
as it soaks in...
I liked it

The years of unrequited love,
the chase for affection,
the tortured artist
twisted up in twisted tortured
feelings

I spent year writing
dark poems,
letting the liquid manifest as a physical representation
of the tears shed
and bleeding heart.
Did I like it?

My existence was
wandering streets alone,
getting lost in melancholy songs,
wondering if love equated pain.

Then I found
what I told my notebook
I'd been searching for all along.
Someone loves me,
someone gives me love,
and I spent so much time searching for it,
enjoying the hunt and
getting gratification out
of my own self-deprecation
that I'm lost even though I'm found.

Do I like it?
Did I like that?
Do I like this?

I can't seem to decipher
affection and how it's supposed to
make me feel
versus how it does.
Did I like looking for it more than having it?

Am I so ****** up that
I love not receiving love more than receiving it?

I don't want to run; I want to stay;
I always used to run
to
     and away.

I have forgotten what
it feels like to be
loved.
It is so odd and
most definitely sad,
as I still know so
substantially what it
feels like to
love.
My existence is so
unrequited,
for even when you
again shared your
body with me,
even though two years
time had passed since
our last dance,
the wall you built remained intact.
I searched every surface
in hopes of finding a crack
in the stone that,
with some effort,
could finally help me to
topple the blockade.
But your love,
or what I have (probably pathetically)
convinced myself
exists on the other side,
it is as well-protected and
well-hidden as ever.
So I soldier on,
fighting my losing battle,
feeling love for you,
the love from which
I am doomed to be destroyed,
shot down, blood staining the
ground
beneath me,
no shield of your love
with which my body,
my heart,
could remain intact.

The way that you look at me
Takes my breath away
It feels extraterrestrial
From another dimension
As if I’m living another being’s life.

The way that you look at me
Lights me up like kerosine
While simultaneously freezing my body into goosebumps.

The way that you look at me
Make me look at myself differently;

I love me more in loving you
I love me more in you loving me.