Right now it is easy to love you.

You crawl into my arms, and let their strength pretend to shield you.

You let me press my lips to your temple and act as though I can comfort you,

Your head tucked against my breast.

I love you fluently,

Feeling your patterns flow over my hands, their weft and weave,

Like god in their clarity and warmth.

I cannot spin us into what we want, each of those things so opposite.

And I can buoy you now, but without you near it creeps upon me again and

I am so afraid.

I see it striding confidently forward, coming down the road to meet us,

Neither a swagger nor a barrel, but

The ineluctable approach of the pain that will crush me again.

I left you.

Couldn’t you have let me?

Because I don’t believe that you want me.

And when this passes, as it must, you will cut me to ribbons.