leaking glass

I dreamt of you last night. You filled my darkening soul with the moonlight I remembered you bringing each midnight when the book fell out of my hands and your shirt became knotted in my palms. Your fist beat against my door and there you stood, shirtless like when you'd brush your teeth in the bathroom in the morning. The words pouring out of your mouth weren't words but melodies, curling ghostly fingers into my hair like a breeze curling around headstones. We pushed back onto my red fainting couch like we'd pushed against each other time and time again with bodies hanging off of each other.

Hands turned manic and hungry in the dream as we shoved on through each room in the house, your hand slipping down my skirt and hazy clouds troubling my eyes until they are leaking glass on your bare chest. How did we get here? How did we reach this world where only in a dream can I feel a goodbye leaving your lips and lodging in my ribs? I loved you more than that. You loved us more than that.

Seeing you in your new life woke your ghost up for me once more, let him wander through my door and letting him stain my bedsheets. That immediate and intense recognition at the bar hit me like the bourbon always settles in my kneecaps and makes me faint. If her cough syrup hair can soothe you more than my mocha strands, I am truly happy for you. Her soft eyes and curved chin, I can see they will fit perfectly in your palm.

via *

white flag

The white flag of surrender has been raised. The white flag of peace. Of no ill will. The white flag of clarity and goodbye. I've jumped back and forth between humiliated and jubilated. Sadness and relief. It's not as hard as I thought it would be to let you go.

My sister talked me down and after surrounding myself with family and light, I saw the dark cloud you brought with you. I was hugged this weekend. Truly hugged. I was believed in and praised. I felt like me again. I felt excited for the future instead of imprisoned in the past, reaching up between the bars and barely grazing the silver lining of a future cloud.

I gave you everything I had. All of my faith was thrust to you. All I wanted to do was reassure you about how wonderful you are and how much potential you have. Through that process I lost my own potential and my dreams too.

The saddest part is that you didn't take any of it. Not a word. You stayed self deprecating and difficult and distant. You want so badly to be the bad guy, but you need to understand that you are a good guy. You would be a winner if you let yourself. If you pushed yourself or cared about more than just appearing unfeeling, you could dig yourself out of this mess. Maybe I could love you again.

This is what I've realized. You've changed. You aren't who you were when you were with me and I needed to be told that no matter what I did, I could never make you believe in yourself again. That's not my job. If you choose to stay this dark and deviant, I have to let you. Maybe one day you will wake up and I will be able to smile at you again. Best of luck in staying sad and drunk. I'll be over here living my life and laughing in love.

I loved you hard. I loved your memory though. It took seeing a weekend full of funerals and and family for me to realize that if I were to walk back in to you, I'd walk straight to death. I wouldn't be happy and I'd be held back.

I was wrong earlier. I was right to get brave. I was right to call you and thank you so much for answering me. It helped me see that you weren't you anymore and to see my potential again. My love for you had turned phantasmagorical. I was chasing my past and if I learned anything from Gatsby, it's the danger of doing that. I need to chase a brighter tomorrow, not a 10 watt past. I'm ready to be alone for a while. To see myself before I see others. I'm excited to be me for a while.

I don't think you will follow through in calling me. And that's ok. I don't know if I'd go anyway. It would be for the wrong reasons now. Thank you for inspiring beautiful poetry, I'm sure you still will. Thank you for the beautiful past. Thank you for making me see that I want no part of that to intoxicate my future, no matter how beautiful it was. I'll always look back at it with warm nostalgia.

Good luck, love. Goodbye.

via *