Connect with me in this sea of life
An open ocean of pain and strife
Come with me in this forest of dreams
The magic and mystery in its streams
Lay with me in this star lit night
The beauty it shows is quite a sight
Play with me in these hills of snow
The smiles and laughs we will show
Kiss me in this pouring rain
Warming our hearts from this pain

'Why is it so painful to grow?'

A seed.
Just a seed buried under the ground.
Under the pressure of the soil,
It fights to grow.

The seed cracks,
such a sturdy little seed,
opens with a painful snap.

A sprout coils out.
Out of the cracked little seed.
A sprout now crushed under,
Under the pressure of the unforgiving ground.

Yet still... It grows.

A little sprout,
Now reaches up.
Up and away from the little seed,
and up to the light of the sun.

Pushing and groaning it bursts out.
Out from the unforgiving ground.
Yet now new dangers are to be found.

Will it be trampled
Or eaten alive?
The possibilities are endless,
The ways it could die.

And still.. it grows.

The sprout toils endlessly,
always stretching and growing
Reaching for the crimson sun.

The rain falls down
beating upon the sprout.
Pelting it's skin and whipping it about.
It skin hardens painfully,
and sprout becomes stem.

And still It grows.
The stem keeps reaching,
Stretching to the sky.

The stem then splits
It rips in two a bud appears
A little bud,
With so much to do.

Then the bud breaks
A crack appears
a petal unfurls from within.

Then it's a bloom.
Such a sweet little thing.
Until the crack stretches
So the bloom can grow
In to the beautiful rose
We've all come to know.

And still.. it grows.

Thorns burst free
Breaking out of the stem
And petals billow and grow in the breeze.

Then you see me,
And my beauty delights you,
So you wish to see me every day.
And your scissors encircle me
To give you your way.

They cut me in half.
They slice me in two.
being a rose,
There was naught I could do.

You carry me with you,
Your hands coated in my blood,
I'm dying slowly,
All for your love.

And now... I can't grow.

So as I bleed and wither in pain,
You place me in a vase
Or press me in a book,
All to save the bloom for another day.

And as I gasp for air,
Among your dry pages,
You leech me of all life,
Perfectly preserved
just so I could last the ages.

Or else I am drowning
In glass and water
My beauty wasted
hour by hour
Day by day
All to satisfy your whimsical ways.

And now all I wish to know,
'Why is it so painful to grow?'

When he finally asks what’s wrong, tell him that he’s really just too good for you and you're afraid that one day he’ll wake up and realize that he could sleep with so many better women.
When he leaves the apartment and gets in the back of a taxi cab at two in the morning, don't follow him.
Maybe even though you saw him with another woman, laughing and joking in a smoky bar with their heads held close together, you still think you have a shot with him.
You don’t.

Dress yourself up if for no other reason than making yourself feel good. Put on your tightest, tiniest little black dress and some high heels and have a dance party in your own room with the stereo blasting.
Throw away his photos. Delete his texts, crumple up his notes and slot them into the paper shredder like old credit cards.
Thinking about him is dangerous; do not lie in bed in a quivering heap for days at a time. Do not mope or hit the snooze button simply so you can drift off to sleep and dream about him.
Jump in the shower and wash him out of your hair. Scrub your skin raw until you cannot smell him anymore. Wash your sheets. As you take them out of the dryer, practice saying your first and last name with adding his on.

Wreck your journal. This is the required “fresh start” your best friend told you about on New Years. She is tough and practical. Consider being more like her. Decide against it because having an affair with your husbands best friend is not practical.
Let your thoughts flow into questions that you pose to the world. Tell yourself that this is not an unfortunate habit.
Remind yourself that today in the modern world, if you’re single, that doesn't mean you’re missing “your other half.”  There isn't someone else out there running around with two arms and two legs and one head who used to be attached to one side of your body and will eventually find you again, on the street or in a deli or even at an indie rock concert in the back row; there’s just you. An imperfectly perfect human being who likes coffee or maybe hates it and has said awful, regrettable things to somebody else and is still trying to figure out how this whole life thing works.

When you are on the couch of your living room, do not reach out to squeeze the faces in the smoke you blow; do not think of his face. Reach out and draw the lines in your mothers face. She would have wanted you to.