Just as I'm about to give up,
you give me yet another reason to hold on,
but I can't afford to feel this way much longer;
I can't keep fighting for something
when I don't remember what it is I'm fighting for.

So in order to feel at peace
and get rid of this dark cloud
that's been circling over me,
there's something I must do,
or rather, something I must say to you.

I surrender.

I give in to your perfect smile
and your chocolate brown eyes,
the ones that make me melt every time.

I submit to the sound of your voice
and the way it carries me from a world I fear
into the safety of your arms.

I no longer resist the urge to look your way,
the need to know if you're looking back at me,
because I do not fear your observation;
I only welcome it.

I allow you to see the feelings I've suppressed
in this war between the good in my heart
and the mess in my mind.

Because I surrender, not for you,
but because I think it's about time.

He makes me feel a way you never once did,
but you both made me feel something.

He and I talk like we're best friends,
but we used to have conversations like strangers,
getting to know each other better
with each and every word.

And even though he makes me feel
just as happy as I felt with you,
I don't get a rush when I hear him say my name;
I don't look for him in a crowded room.

So I guess I just can't figure out
whether I fell for him to get over you
or so that he could lead me back.

I do my best writing in the dark,
for it is in the absence of light
that I see you most vividly.

But I'm sure to do all my thinking in the day,
because the sun helps melt away the vision
of your chocolate brown eyes,
carried throughout my memories.

But although your appearance sometimes fades
and the sound of your voice I forget more quickly
than half of my classmates' names,
I will forever hold onto our unforgettable moments
oh-so tightly within my brain.

Because how could I erase the first time we spoke,
or our last goodnight at that football game?
Don't think I'll neglect all the good times we had
just because the two of us are no longer the same.

And who could disregard that summer day,
where I first heard you speak my name,
or each and every one of our conversations
and the silly reasons for which they came?

I know it may seem like I'm filled with hate
from the decision that you made,
but in all honesty I still cling to the hope
that we will be together someday.

So please help me to hold on;
give me the faith that I desire
so that our burnt-out flame can be reborn
into an eternal fire.

And trust in your intuition
so that it can allow you to see
that I am still in love with you
and you were always in love with me.

We tell lies
to reveal the truth
which in itself is too honest
to be revealed.

We trick our minds
into believing false realities
so that we can feel at least
the slightest bit healed.

This is how the broken heart beats;
this is how we get on.
And to protect my own fractured heart,
I told myself to move on.

Pick up the pieces he shattered,
and allow him no excuse.
Leave within a timely fashion,
and no further conclusions shall you deduce.

Let things be as they may
before you get even more hurt.
Take your heart with you in its entirety
and leave him to be with her.

I know this is a task among tasks,
a trial of great tribulation,
but without following these careful instructions,
your heart will require ventricular fibrillation.

And I guarantee some hurt will remain,
but that is surely a good thing,
because if you did not feel at all,
then your heart would not be working.

So continue to be a warrior.
Fight with lack of speech rather than word.
And let the silence speak to him
louder than a piercing sword.

It may take some time,
but in his mind will your reason be sealed,
because if you walk the path of the broken,
you will at last be healed.

An angel stripped of her halo,
locked in a dungeon
of self-doubt and heartbreak,
longs to be saved.

She dreams of her knight in shining armor
rescuing her from the fear onto which she clings,
the same fear that stifles her uttermost dreams.

But her saving grace must fight his own battle,
a ferocious war between the good he once found in her heart
and the evil that still plagues his own mind.

The bright light that used to shine from within her eyes
has lessened to a mere glimmer of fluctuating hope,
and her once supple lips have slowly but steadily dried,
for it has been so long since they tasted freedom.

But what must it take for this beauty to be saved?

She has been taken from a world of wonder,
a planet of peaceful longing and generous love,
into an isolated cell unto which no living being has stumbled.

For this prison is within her own mind.

And it is up to her
to save herself.

It is yet to be ten o'clock
and the lights in my room
are already off
because only in the darkness
of my deepest dreams
am I able to see you.

Yes, I see you in the halls at school,
but no reality will ever again
allow me to see
the feelings I swear
you once had for me.

So I drift off into a deep, deep sleep...

A shimmering glimmer of thoughts
fades into a distorted actuality
where we smile and seem happy
as if we're in some sort of
Alice-in-Wonderland-type fantasy.

All the pain and heartbreak disappears peacefully
into an abyss of oblivion,
down a black-hole of bad memories
and missed opportunities
that torment me in the daylight.

And in that exact moment,
you decide to wander into
the unoccupied cavities
of my innermost mind,
thus beginning the same dream
I live out every night:

It seems I'm in a car,
heading down a long, straight stretch of road,
one that, every time, I swear I've never once seen.

I'm surrounded by a sea of busy people,
like black and white dots fluttering around
amidst a broken television screen.

But the two of us are in no hurry
to get where we want to go,
because we have no plan but to drive
down this long, straight stretch of road.

So I gaze out the window and roll it down
to weave my fingers through the breeze,
propping my bare feet up against the dash
because it makes me feel free.

I hear you laugh that adorable laugh
as I turn my head to see
your curious gaze wondering
how you came to be so lucky.

And it is right then
that through those deep brown eyes,
I'm able to read every single thought
that passes through your mind.

I know you wish
you could jump inside mine,
but little do you know
you do almost every single night...

So as the dream goes on,
so does the same old road,
taking us God-knows-where
in however much time we please.

Having no destination makes us feel free
from all the burdens brought unto us
by this monster we call reality.

But just as the other cars start to leave
and we begin picking up some speed,
a bright red light puts a brief end to our journey.

And even though this light eventually turns green,
the road that lies ahead is not what it seems,
for it twists and turns differently in every dream,
throwing us for loops that we'd never once seen.

And all of a sudden,
I'm jolted from my sleep,
awoken by a harsh reminder
that comes from within me.

We can only be together
between the hours of 10 and 2,
because in each of my dreams,
we're just driving,
unaware of the reality we'll wake up to.

Sometimes I can't help but take a moment
and picture how we might've been different today
if on that early October day,
I hadn't decided to walk away.

I can't help but question
what we'd be like now
if instead,
I had chosen to stay.

As I lie awake at night
or even sit outside
in broad daylight,
the toxic thoughts penetrate my mind,
and they never fail
to take me back
to that late-September night.

I see me sitting next to you,
your arm around mine,
nervous glances being exchanged
in the quiet of an otherwise
chaotic night.

Next I'm forced to relive
our innocent goodbye,
when you walked me to the gate
and said, "Goodnight."

Then time flashes forward
to the day everything changed,
when I found out the reason
you'd been acting so strange.

I can't forget hearing
her three-syllable name.
I swear I nearly went insane.

I see the pain in my eyes as a single drop
begins the seemingly unending river of tears,
streaming from the same eyes you used to gaze into
and down past the lips you never got a chance to kiss.

I see myself cutting you out of my life,
not slowly, but all at once,
like ripping off a bandage
because I'd foolishly thought
that would lessen the pain.

I listen to myself saying "no" to you
when, for the past two months,
I would've given anything for you to ask me
so I could've finally said "yes."

I see all of this over and over again,
unable to stop it,
unable to remind myself
that I made the right choice
in leaving you.

All I can picture is the future I lost,
more vividly than I can see
the world right in front of me.

All I can imagine is this:

Your sweaty palm nervously inching toward mine.
My face blushing with anticipation as our hands become entwined.

Wrapping our arms around each other just to stay warm
and cuddling beside the fire in the midst of a snow storm.

The two of us slow-dancing in the middle of the pouring rain
because when you're in love, who cares if you look insane?

Tears streaming down my face as I cry on your shoulder;
my best friend and I are fighting, but you promise it'll be over.

Kissing at a red light that soon fades to green,
cars honking at us because they don't know what it means
to have fallen for someone outside of your dreams
and into his arms like a movie scene.

...that is what I see.

I imagine us doing all the things
we never got to do,
and I almost hate myself
for killing my own chance
at happiness with you.

But then I close my eyes
and block it all out.

All the moments,
the memories,
the what-ifs,
they're gone.

All I see is complete and total darkness.

But no matter how tightly I close my eyes,
I'll never be able to make the thought of you
into merely a memory.

No matter how badly I wish to move on,
our pasts will always be intertwined,
and we will be linked indefinitely.

And nothing I do will ever change the reality
that you'll forever be much more than a memory
to me.