Beneath me is a busy street, around me are caffeine fiends, behind me are friends, yet I am momentarily stuck on what I cannot reach. My mind has not left our last encounter.
We were both so still, neither of us knowing how to react, as the lyrics so accurately depicted our feelings toward one another.
Alone, silent, and constricted we listened. I was so hopeful, you were so distant. As we created together your sadness lifted and the air was different. We left our hearts in our heads and explored the humor we've always used. After creating you told me that you felt the only cure for depression was creation. I smiled and felt like crying as I looked at your eyes. I had no response.
"I feel I must be wearing my welcome. I must be moving on. My intentions were good intentions. I could have loved you, I could have changed you. I wouldn't be so, I wouldn't feel so consumed by selfish thoughts. I'm sorry if I feel self effacing, consumed by selfish thoughts. It's only that I still love you deeply, it's all the love I got," sang Sufjan. We so silently listened. We did not look at one another. We were both scared in that moment. I was scared in that moment. I did not expect what I heard, I was scared of what I heard, as he had taken the thoughts out of my head.
Perhaps those lyrics did not strike you in the way they struck me. They were piercing. But I know you; your thoughts wander to places that I cannot reach in those moments.
Your mind travels so far. I used to know where you went, in your fits of silence, but you have changed. I know so little as the direction. East, West, near, far. I can only guess.
Now I sit at the window, silently listening to music that we so recently silently listened to together. Still so accurately depicting how I feel.
You have changed, you have grown, you have shrunk. I have done the same, for better and for worse. Our love is seemingly lost, but still lingers in every conversation and glance and thought.
This same place, where I wrote about you, both good and bad, where I spoke to you on the phone, where we came together. This place has not changed at all. It doesn't know how much we've changed, how much you've changed, or how much I've changed. But in some ways, we are just like this place in which I sit - we haven't changed. We remain the same.