When I was young and bold and strong,
Oh, right was right, and wrong was wrong!
My plume on high, my flag unfurled,
I rode away to right the world.
"Come out, you dogs, and fight!" said I,
And wept there was but once to die.

But I am old; and good and bad
Are woven in a crazy plaid.
I sit and say, "The world is so;
And he is wise who lets it go.
A battle lost, a battle won--
The difference is small, my son."

Inertia rides and riddles me;
The which is called Philosophy.

I build a house of cards with the deck of hearts and present it to you.
And upon seeing all my full, red expressions of affection, you shuffle and deal out my imperfections until
one by one,
my house falls down.

Your diamonds aren't as illuminous as they were after your first sip, you say.
So all your glitter isn't really gold, you say while
shifting my diamond to a rhombus never to turn it right side up again.

Your clubs beat me over the head and cause my brain to swell with a smooth aftertaste as you
see through my lack
of a poker face.
Breaking through my walls and exposing my weak points.
Flooding over my defenses and ensnaring me in a trap
weaved only by the highest proof
and I know you have won.

Because my ace of spades has been found.
Trickling your jokers over the rocks to my hearts,
they climb over the rubble that has been laid at the ground, the foundation, the base.
And your clubs tear it up!
And the jokers, you! race to the top of the south and with your strongest clubs,
break into my ace of spades!

Pinning it to the ground and forcing it to turn around and flee!
And I can hear it! I hear it calling for me... to help us get away
but my hearts are dull and my shifting rhombi are ablaze.  
For this infinite moment in time is dazzling and my own eyes aren't aligned to light the way
to free me.

Gleaming rays of the sheen from your diamonds slice through my illusions and
wake me up to the aroma of fresh debris.
My hearts, toppled.  My diamonds, demolished.
My clubs, sleeping and my ace of spades,
removed.

And the sky never changes. The moon ripples in the puddle left behind by the design
of your jokers and spades and your hearts remain untouched.  Your spades are buried behind walls of
black and your diamonds are so far back that I couldn't tell if they were even there at all.

My deck of 52 is now a deck of 51 and without a solid set,

I'll never have the chance to play this "game" again.

Smooth sun slides across the cerulean sky
And reaching trees drip gleaming arias
Into wilting snow.
Tears of winter course down channeled trunks
As snaring frost recedes into time
Memory still aglow.

I opened my eyes once just to see if his were shut as tight as mine.
I could tell by the way he moved, how angry he was with her.
It was nothing between him and I.

It was pure emotion we couldn’t express to each other without imitating the act of making love.
We were the only ones left there for the other
or maybe we were just there.
Probability.

I do not love him.
…but he breathed like you. Kissed like you.
He was built like you, cried like you.

I hope you understand.

It was my only release.
It was not affection for each other that drove us into such a passionate entanglement but the restrained love we had for each of you.

The Anger. The Sadness. The Loneliness.
We were open journals,
and we filled each other with feelings that words could not express.

…I missed you so much.

He’s the only one who could ever understand how much I did.
While our bodies were dripping with shame,
what else could we have done?

I felt his feelings for her and they broke my heart.
There was no stopping.

The tighter he held,
the softer he whimpered,
the more it pulled me in.

The more I understood the less alone I felt.
This dismal place became less painful.

I was not out to hurt you.
It did not bloom from spite or revenge.
Not for you.

While his body did grind into mine,
I felt the pain of his anatomy and I used it against myself.
His body was my only way to repair and destroy myself all at once.

It was pleasurable due to the dream I had woven into it,
and I could feel his muscles forgiving me.
Forgiving her.

I wonder what he felt come from mine.
Relief, I hope.

Once the sweat and tears had dried,
and our bodies lay throbbing and limp
there was a sense of calm neither of us had ever experienced.

Although I’ll never be able to tell you how I feel,
I know I confessed everything I could that day with my writhing
and with my heat.

It was all for you.

Even though we did not let it happen through love or adoration
it was not meaningless.
Our souls confided in and approved of our scene.

That’s all I needed.
For it to be known I did not cheat.
I did not cheat you and I did not cheat myself.

Now, I don’t think I could love you as much as I do now had it not happened.
I found us that day.
Buried beneath years reconstruction and restriction.
More importantly, I found myself.
Lodged in between the freezing of time and heartache.

I’ll miss my innocence, but not my ignorance.

I opened my eyes just to see if his eyes were shut as tight as mine.
I had never felt so utterly complete.

For all of his homeliness,

he walked with an air of majesty and purpose.

A hard and sunken bespectacled face, hollowed out from weight loss

emphasizes knowledgeable grey eyes

He shuffles through papers and runs his fingers through his

long blond hair.

A never ending cycle,

he’s always doing one or the other.

And fidgeting with his head phones- he hands me one.

“What do you hear?”

His eyes are searching mine for my thoughts,

dancing with anticipation as to what I might say.

“Do you hear that?” he asks.

He always looked so hungry, like he wants answers.

I can’t remember the last time I saw him eat.

I touch what was once a cheek.

“You look so thin.”

He doesn’t say anything. His eyes just flash- each one different.

The left says “Shut the **** up.”

The right says “Help me.”

Please don’t be afraid to let someone in.

Please.

He walks hard, every stride like he plans to take over a country.

Oh there is purpose in his steps.

He has the brightest mind.

He’s hard, but he can see beauty where others can’t.

He knows absolutely everything about me.

“Why would something so beautiful want to die?” he asks me.

I’ll remember those words for the rest of my life.

Life is precious.

And despite all of the hardships we have seen, the years that have passed,

I still love him.

Sometimes I cry.
Usually it's before bed.
My pillow becomes wet with tears
let loose by loneliness, anger, surrender.
My body shakes as each sob tears through my soul
and vibrates through my vocal chords to come out as helpless whimpers.
My arms constantly reach for comfort and reassurance, but grasp nothing but despair.
I blink through the tears, seeing nothing,
and wonder why I'm still alive.
If anyone would miss me if I were gone.
My lungs search for air in gasps
between each bout of fresh tears
and take in thick fog
that suffocates everything but my cries.
I can feel my heart physically breaking
and losing its once-steady beat.
This goes on for the longest time.
Until my throat is parched, my tongue is dry, and my eyes are empty
My body numbs over and everything goes limp.
I am already unconscious though I am awake, so there is no transition to sleep.
I do not dream.
I wake up the next morning with crusty eyes
and a sunken feeling.
There is no relief.