i don’t want to be this person.
she is conflicted
and paralyzed
by the weight of history.
her mistakes bloom upon her skin:
bruises surface
and the abrasions sting.
i’m so fucking tired
of being everyone and no one.
your quiet accusations rub me raw
as if i don’t know the truth
it’s not fair
(life’s not, i know)
to be this alive
and yet already buried.
this girl is not the girl
i thought i’d be
but she is who i am.
a disappointment.
at the moment of departure
caught between truth and desire
my atrophied heart beats
and i want to stay. i want to feel.
but of course i leave
i don’t stay where i don’t belong.
the abrupt declination
surprises no one but me
even as i had kept the end in mind
from the beginning.
all the joy
will be forgotten
in such a brief time.
it will be as if i had never existed
someday you will not be able to recall my name
or see my face in your mind.
which is to be expected.
i was the only one who needed the heat
to feel alive
needed the words to feel less alone
needed the lie to remember what truth felt like.
it will be easier next time. at least
there’s that. i am never the one
that sticks. i slide off.
i wash off like watercolor
your mistake.
everyone’s mistake.
there will be one, or two,
who will be worth it
and it will be easier
and i will be forgotten:
yesterday’s headline.
broken glass.
i knew
this was coming
i knew
i was a mirror
and nothing more.
nothing hurts—
not really—
i’ll be fine. i’m always fine.
just give me a moment
to slide back into apathy.
i find myself alone
unsurprisingly.
i just want to walk away
from this
letting it all burn behind me.
there’s no joy
to be found between the first
oblivion and the last,
you know.
hope sours in the light of day
and connection turns to isolation
in an instant.
all the time wasted—
the search for meaning
the search for purpose—
it comes up empty in the face of reality.
we are nothing in the face of eternity
and there is nothing to face in eternity.
say my name
a fervent prayer to stone gods
and empty temples
there’s nothing here
that can assuage the emptiness.
but the heat enslaves.
as i mimic life in this broken landscape
your words echo
across the wasteland
indistinct and limned with fear
i can taste it
even at this distance.
i’ve been there,
where you are,
hollowed out and ravenous
surprised by joy
in the depths of complacency.
i am drowning
silently going under
numb and empty
i’ve gone dark.
i want nothing but the eternal present
i want nothing but this moment
bright with possibility
bereft of hope
someday we’ll leave this place
and not look back.
until then
be mine.
i hold the last thing you said to me
in my mind
so i will never forget
why i left. so when the sadness
and disappointment fade
and memory recasts courtesy
as tenderness
i will be reminded not to let you pull
me under again.
you gave me nothing.
that response—
the one you had to
that deeply personal admission,
made accidentally—
it’s not normal.
humans don’t react that way
to the hurt
of those they care for.
unless they don’t care.
but that assumption
in itself is unsupportable
considering how humans connect
to the hurt of those
they’ve never met.
perhaps you hate me.
it would be an explanation
confusing yet plausible—
probable even—
i’ve done nothing to merit
this unmitigated disgust
or your boorish lack of courtesy
but frankly,
i lack the energy to care.
i don’t deserve the bitterness you’ve
directed at me or
your callous disregard for my kindness.
you are strange
you are cruel.
you’re a liar.
you were always the problem.
my mistake was coming back
each time you tore me down.
i cannot believe how good it feels
to be free
of the depth of your emptiness.
here
at the end of the road
where pavement turns to shattered glass
i may bleed
but it will not be for you.
if i meant nothing
it was your brokenness at fault.
i can walk away
unscathed
because in the end i am everything i need
and you are a mistake.
someone i met.
a face i can only half remember;
it was never familiar.
you are nothing more than a lie
in the ether.
proudly
i acknowledge what i’ve learned
from you:
never ask a question
you don’t want answered
and yet i hear my voice
so small in the dark
“wouldn’t you miss me if i left?”
your answer doesn’t matter
it’s the silence that speaks
and i don’t have to see your eyes
to know the truth.
i’ve known the truth since the beginning.
sometimes i wish you’d lie.
i grow weary
of navigating your roadblocks
and negotiating your terrain.
your intentional difficulty
takes the joy from the journey;
at this point
i am only tired
and sad.
i am so sad.
i have decided to give
instead of take
and have received nothing but your
unmitigated disdain.
thank you for that,
for the reinforcement.
i will not stop
giving my joy
to those who may not deserve it.
because life happens once
and that is too infrequent to waste on
self-protection.
so you didn’t love me.
and i will never know why.
this is your loss—
remember that when i am gone.
