Last week I was taught that
no matter how complex an expression may seem
if you multiply it by its conjugate pair
you will always end up with a non-negative real solution.
That is a metaphor for how we have learned to love.

I used to like mathematics, as strange as it may sound,
because memorising the value of pi was
somehow easier than forgetting the notion of you
and I thought maybe comprehending the mechanics of the universe
would lead me one step closer to cracking the combination.

In a world that spins at the rate of 27,900m per minute, a constant can prove tricky to find.
Hence, there is solace to be felt in knowing that even when it is all said and done –
when the final bullet has slipped from our tongues and we are left trembling
upon nothing but the rubble of our own destruction,
two plus three will still be equal to five.

In an attempt to clarify a theory to the class, my teacher analogised
that mathematics is like one big giant jigsaw puzzle:
everything always fits together perfectly in the end
Since then I have learned it is the method without the madness,
the passion for the predictable; it is everything - that love is not.

Not even the greatest mathematician in the world
has been able to measure how much a heart can hold.
There is no algorithm for how to make you come back;
I cannot draw a line graph on the speed at which love left
and even if I could, our gradients would never be the same.

I may have both halves of the bed,
but there is never enough space to fill it with.
If a task takes four hours for ten people to complete
and the same job takes five people twice that time,
how long will it take for a human to feel whole again?

Sometimes I think we are nothing more
than two parallel lines that accidentally crossed paths.