Sitting here.
Face wet, body tired.
Immobilized, frozen in the horror of memories,
of stale wants and preserved fantasies.
The horror of desiring, yet never to receive.
Never to kiss that warm neck.
Never to unbutton that soft, worn shirt.
Never to gain a kiss from that beautiful smile.


Sitting here.
Choking on so many desires.
Lodged into the back of the throat they threaten to ****, you can't make a sound.
But they make no promises.
All they bring are silent tears, and the echo of everything you will never have.
It fills your head, the loudest thing you will ever hear.
It is fact.
The fact is that nothing survives.
Everything is subject to ruin.
But not desire.
Not love.

They end when you do.

These days, I could care ever less if the sky fell,
or if I got hit by a meteorite,
or by a speeding car
with you behind the wheel.

I don't understand. I can't grasp the concept of
why you left, why you no longer think I even exist.
Now, it's as if I'm less than the smoke you breathe in,
less than the wind that passes through your hair.  

I would've taken all of your roughness
to the teeth, I would have swallowed
your every ***** fantasy and bad thought,
down to the hard, prickly rind and rough shell,
and still I would have wanted more.

I would have taken it all:
every verbal slap
every rough kiss
every emotional breakdown
every "I don't feel good enough"
every ******* way you ever ****** me off...
and every "I love you, babygirl."

******* you, I love you.

Ironic, isn't it?

The story is:

  I woke up too soon

  grew too fast

  loved too hard

  felt too much.

They say, "If you don't believe in something, you'll fall for anything."

Well I believed,

and then I fell.

What now?

There are these amazing,
mind quieting moments
I sometimes experience.
They can only last perhaps
a couple of hours, or my mind
shivers and shakes and it can't stand
the blooming openness of that moment.
In these moments I am me
in the vastness of everything that
could be or would be
and the universe is flowing through
just me
and I don't feel anything in these moments,
just a bit of lightness,
a complete, unbreakable openness.
I don't feel deep black fear, or the stark
whiteness of loneliness.
Yet bits and pieces of the monster inside me
are taken out and put into something
concrete and visible.
I wish with all my giant, full-blooded heart
that I could feel like this forever and always.
Then there would be no beast,
no fear, no black hole of desire
or betrayal.
I wouldn't feel like a jar of
sealed tight me
that not even the strong man of the show
could twist open.
I'd finally have freedom.

I think I figured this out.

And I think I could be happy without you
Maybe your mouth
isn't so sweet,
or your eyes so warm
Maybe I don't crave you like
the chocolate I crave since you've gone
And maybe I could go a day without thinking
about how your hand would feel in mine
And maybe the way you believe and think
could just once fail to make my insides
**** and fly into a fine-tuned frenzy

I think I could be okay.

And leave you.
You're not my cover story,
my hard binding protecting
the soft, pink, veiny insides.
You've had a good place for a heart's age
But it's long past time.

Time for you to get out of the ******* way.

Stationary and visible, chewing on my time.

It tastes like licorice and smells of burning autumn leaf piles.

I've been told there's a limit, with which the flavor will dissipate

and turn stale like an excessively chewed piece of gum.

I chew and chew, unable to swallow,

hoping for a freeze frame or a rewind button.

All things change, all things face the promise of ruin and renewal.

I tense and crouch, bracing myself for time like a fierce animal, ready for this pivotal fight.

I feel the long wave rising and breathing, aching to stretch and collide with my shore.

I look up, a threatening shadow cast upon my face, too much like a quiet night.

This is my time. I don’t want it yet, but it’s unstoppable, so I might as well swallow my screams

and rush in with my own current.


© Morgan Graham  July 8, 2011

Stuck in a lost place,
it is impossible to be happy with nothing or everything.
I don't know.
But I do know.
And all I want is you.
To be falling.
With you.