#romanticdisillusionment

Take me as a definition: a surface-level heart that drowns in deep thought, quietly pondering love, quietly grieving loss. Loss not just for someone; a loss for most words. Because when you’ve been dealing with a lot, you stop explaining and start enduring. Take me, for example: yesterday I had a conversation with myself, but it sounded like I was addressing the ugly stuff, the versions of me I don’t post about. Getting a little older, I now feel the subtraction of duration settling in my bones. It’s not pain exactly. It’s more like time knocking without waiting for permission. Multiply that by multiple misfires, all the times I believed, in my head, that I’d finally found _the one_. Now, I’m left divided. Not between people, but between the stories I told myself; the truths I keep avoiding. Insanely rich with poor results — "wait, that doesn’t add up." As that’s the math of memory: it never balances the way love promises it will. Still I need a leg up, not just to raise the hopes of this tired heart, but just to step out of my despairs. Because lately, I’ve been third-wheeling the very idea of love; a tagalong to a party I used to host. And when it comes to falling for someone with a previously broken heart, you learn quick: it doesn’t come with a spare. I’ve realized love either helps you make strong memories or leaves you with the memory of a _sus stain_. You can’t always tell which until it’s already on you, and by then you’re already trying to scrub out that which you hoped to sustain. __The Arithmetic of Almost-Love.__

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Aug 3, 2025

Aug 3, 2025 at 7:03 PM UTC

OddOdysseyPoet

The Arithmetic of Almost-Love

Take me as a definition: a surface-level heart that drowns in deep thought, quietly pondering love, quietly grieving loss. Loss not just for someone; a loss for most words. Because when you’ve been dealing with a lot, you stop explaining and start enduring. Take me, for example: yesterday I had a conversation with myself, but it sounded like I was addressing the ugly stuff, the versions of me I don’t post about. Getting a little older, I now feel the subtraction of duration settling in my bones. It’s not pain exactly. It’s more like time knocking without waiting for permission. Multiply that by multiple misfires, all the times I believed, in my head, that I’d finally found _the one_. Now, I’m left divided. Not between people, but between the stories I told myself; the truths I keep avoiding. Insanely rich with poor results — "wait, that doesn’t add up." As that’s the math of memory: it never balances the way love promises it will. Still I need a leg up, not just to raise the hopes of this tired heart, but just to step out of my despairs. Because lately, I’ve been third-wheeling the very idea of love; a tagalong to a party I used to host. And when it comes to falling for someone with a previously broken heart, you learn quick: it doesn’t come with a spare. I’ve realized love either helps you make strong memories or leaves you with the memory of a _sus stain_. You can’t always tell which until it’s already on you, and by then you’re already trying to scrub out that which you hoped to sustain. __The Arithmetic of Almost-Love.__

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__Two-step verification__ — it takes two to fall in love, but that’s yet to be confirmed. Grinding gears just to talk, shifting through awkward conversations, but we can’t reverse all the bad things we’ve said at those rushing high speeds. Lovers with underwear conversations, trying to fix what they barely understood, so unaware of what’s really the problem. We run into relationships holding open scissors —the result? Just another love story cut too short. But teach yourself to love someone new, still maybe the lesson won’t stick. So brace for impact when they say, "I truly love embracing you." And I feel like Saturday news — as they talk about us like weekend headlines. They say I left my imprint on you, but that just comes from being pressed for a time, rushing to report every mistake before the feeling fades. Needing nothing — and in the same breath, needing each other. Yet neither of us has anything long-lasting to give. To love someone with real deep depth while they only offer surface depth. _Lurid entertainments._ Frozen, unflattering coitus. And quoting someone else’s expressions because we’re too shy to speak out our own love language. Two people, extending their existence — but modern love feels like this: one of us still alive in the moment, while the other is just living in a picture without you in the end. ////// You claimed to be bound to each other, but it was really bound to end

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Jul 24, 2025

Jul 24, 2025 at 5:36 PM UTC

OddOdysseyPoet

Bound in regret

__Two-step verification__ — it takes two to fall in love, but that’s yet to be confirmed. Grinding gears just to talk, shifting through awkward conversations, but we can’t reverse all the bad things we’ve said at those rushing high speeds. Lovers with underwear conversations, trying to fix what they barely understood, so unaware of what’s really the problem. We run into relationships holding open scissors —the result? Just another love story cut too short. But teach yourself to love someone new, still maybe the lesson won’t stick. So brace for impact when they say, "I truly love embracing you." And I feel like Saturday news — as they talk about us like weekend headlines. They say I left my imprint on you, but that just comes from being pressed for a time, rushing to report every mistake before the feeling fades. Needing nothing — and in the same breath, needing each other. Yet neither of us has anything long-lasting to give. To love someone with real deep depth while they only offer surface depth. _Lurid entertainments._ Frozen, unflattering coitus. And quoting someone else’s expressions because we’re too shy to speak out our own love language. Two people, extending their existence — but modern love feels like this: one of us still alive in the moment, while the other is just living in a picture without you in the end. ////// You claimed to be bound to each other, but it was really bound to end

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__Untie me from your thoughts__ — acting loose from your love; not what I should’ve known. Knot-tongued, unable to say what I’m really feeling inside the chambers of my heart. Dumpling cheekbones feeding off your smile — _it's a soft scene_. But all of our best actions still aren’t worth a movie screen. And aren’t we looking a little too scripted in front of our peers? __You__ — my original promissory note. Please take note of every step you take in my mind, scribbling down your movements like wandering footnotes. ________________________________________ There’s also the shaking __trial of courtship__ — in the jaws of both judges. You say what you want — and it turns out to be exactly what I don’t. You try to live in my thoughts, but I’m still __renting that house__. No roots, no keys — just memories on a month-to-month lease. ________________________________________ To say every man is just, "a dog" — their barking mingles on, chasing their own tails, returning to the ones who wronged them as if _they_ were wrong. But the dog’s got a bone to pick, and it contests every bone. ________________________________________ __Truth is__ — this, like our love, was never meant to be a love poem.

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Jul 2, 2025

Jul 2, 2025 at 4:40 AM UTC

OddOdysseyPoet

This Was Never Meant to Be a Love Poem

__Untie me from your thoughts__ — acting loose from your love; not what I should’ve known. Knot-tongued, unable to say what I’m really feeling inside the chambers of my heart. Dumpling cheekbones feeding off your smile — _it's a soft scene_. But all of our best actions still aren’t worth a movie screen. And aren’t we looking a little too scripted in front of our peers? __You__ — my original promissory note. Please take note of every step you take in my mind, scribbling down your movements like wandering footnotes. ________________________________________ There’s also the shaking __trial of courtship__ — in the jaws of both judges. You say what you want — and it turns out to be exactly what I don’t. You try to live in my thoughts, but I’m still __renting that house__. No roots, no keys — just memories on a month-to-month lease. ________________________________________ To say every man is just, "a dog" — their barking mingles on, chasing their own tails, returning to the ones who wronged them as if _they_ were wrong. But the dog’s got a bone to pick, and it contests every bone. ________________________________________ __Truth is__ — this, like our love, was never meant to be a love poem.

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