since i decided that the chain was too short
and the anchor i had attached myself to
was pulling me under

it's been Three Months since I've sharply inhaled and
let go of the rope
and stood slack-jawed
and in awe
at the calm with which you watched it suddenly go limp in your relaxed palms,
and then shrugged,
and retreated.

Three Months since I've turned my head toward the horizon
and rubbed the tension of staring at a backward-moving object
from my weary neck.

Three Months of my infatuation worming its way back into more isolated parts of my mind,
and festering in my body,
becoming quiet--
like the absence of a laugh track
while the film keeps playing.

And I feel like I am still holding my breath.
It's different now because I finally see the pattern.
Breathe easily,
       breathe excitedly,
gasp,
hold your breath,
                  feel it abruptly leave your body as you deflate
find your breath again,
                  have it stolen from you once more

The question is: what will lure my lungs back into blissful submission again? And how much time am I left with to enjoy my returned sanity?

And if you came back,
I think it would feel like a falling dream.
I think I am in the falling dream.
I am grasping and flailing and fearing the crash,
everything becoming a quickening blur of
irrational analysis and false epiphanies,
an asymptote approaching demise...
until
i wake up
(and realize that I never really was falling).

Only to have the ground snatched from under my feet once again
but instead of down, I will go up.
(and then down again)
I wish I wasn't familiar with this pattern.