i think i exist only to love
but never experience,
a pretentious bag of bones like me
will only stir your feelings
     —you will wallow in it for some time
     and then you will forget about me
like a cup of coffee that has gone cold.

but if i must admit,
it's because i do stunt my own growth:
in life, in love, but strangely enough,
                                           not in death.
an odd number of reasons
aid my tendencies;
they get glued together to form
a paper-maché of well-composed farewells
—a craft i have mastered in my years of longing.

i think i exist only to love,
but never experience—
yet here i am, still longing
until i get a hand to hold.