And This Is How It Begins

And this is how it begins

When I rediscover the fear of being undeserving of the things I love

When I forget how to hold the poems on my tounge

When I let the words fester and wilt in my veins

Let the unsaid accumulate in the back of my throat

Dead passages stain my skin shades of neglected potential

When I promise myself I'll end

Or I'll begin

But even I do no trust who I have become

Oh the blood I have shed

Oh the youth I have lost amongst the grief

And for who?

In hopes a river of sorrow, a pathway of scars

Would lead love back

To the hollow parts of me

I carved out

To make room for forgiveness

I deny myself

I wait for inspiration at the door step of my youth. But she has long forsaken the promises we carved into my childhood bedframe. And this is the abandonment of the muse. For there was a season when poetry herself wooed me into unfurling my untried fingers to her pen and for a moment she was encapsulated by the way I bled ink for her. How deep I was willing to tear myself to reach the sweetest similies. Capillaries and couplets. And she kept me. Until the metaphors melted into puddles of half remembered melodies. And she grew bored. I cannot recall which came first.

I always knew her gaze was fickle. Her favour easily shifted with the tilt of the light. And how easy it is to fall into shadow. How beautiful the canvas of the sky when closest to darkness, when teetering on the precipice of the end. I write to her still. Shove the love notes composed of subpar symphonies under the porch where she promised she would return for me. And what does poetry know but already rotting vows.

In some letters I miss her. And in some I ask her forgiveness. In some I bleed, and leave this offering to be unfound. I wring out the papers drenched in desperation, and ask her to hold me. One last time. I ask for a poem. And I use the letters to burn my past to ash. For perhaps the smell of smoke carries farther. Perhaps ash and charred memories, will linger longer than love.

I want to shout at every passing stranger

Every person who thinks they know me now

Do you know

That I was soft once?

That I had long hair and

A small body

And a heart that could have loved you

Do you know that

I could have loved you

Once

I wait for someone to tell me

That I’ve changed

But they do not

And I mourn for the loss of me alone

She will never get to fall in love

When I do, it will not be the same

When it ends it will be an Antarctic winter

Perpetual darkness

Night amongst night

It will be a small dead star long dead

The ones that fade forgotten

In the oblivion of space

She would have done so much better

Her heartbreak would have been spectacular

Would have been Tsunami and supernova

It would have been beautiful destruction and art

It would have been art

It would have birthed revolutions even in her misery

It would have meant something

And even in the absence

Of condolences

I know she did exist

And the darkness calls to me with all the names my mother said were too soft for me

The shadows think I am delicate and I let them, try to let them convince me too

That somewhere something may yet still think I am worthy of gentleness 

You return for me

Once I've finally

Bled your name

Out my veins 

Sometimes there is grief

But most days there is only

The space in my heart

You left behind

Where nothing grows

Anymore

- somedays missing you is an ocean and somedays it is drought