From an early age, I had plans.
I would set the world on fire— everyone would know my name. Then life got in the way, and I realized the world's already on fire. The world only remembers the firefighters. When I found true love, I had plans. It would last forever— no truer love would exist. Then life got in the way, and I came to know that nothing is forever. Certain obligations transcend the heart. After my heart's break, I had plans. I would live uncomplicated-- love couldn't touch me. Then life got in the way, and I discovered a heart still beats. No matter how you try, it will survive. Surviving this long, I have plans. I will live each day just for what it is— no more lofty ambitions and goals. Then life got in the way, and dreams return to my head. Will nothing ever end? Supper was tense that night. We both knew that that day was the threshold; once the sun set our life would be costumed in the sooty cloak of uncertainty. Three years earlier the prophets of medicine had turned their divining glances towards Marie. Their solemn sentence had been three years, possibly more if we played by the rules.
I noticed with satisfaction that she ate more that night than I had ever seen her eat. Her appetite filled me with hope that the high-priced doctors might be mistaken. After the last dish was washed, I joined her on the beach. One look at her proved the falsity of any hope. Her shrunken form was draped across one of the warped chaise lounges, a wilted and trampled rose. Her head swayed from side to side, seemingly too heavy for her stalk-like neck. Tinged by the near full moon she looked more like a shade than any living being. It hurt to see her held in the grip of a glutton that gnawed with indiscriminate patience through flesh, blood, and heart. I peeled her off the sticky vinyl fearing she would dissolve into the salty air. We stood there welded together by the thick heat. She worked her arms around me and let her fingers play on the back of my neck, intensifying the night's heat. Deep hunger tugged at me. I pulled her close and kissed her as I had when we first met. My mind exploded at the platter of flavors my tongue encountered in her mouth. Unexpectedly, the mingled flavors of the dinner we had just enjoyed was reconfigured here in microcosm. "What do you feel?" she asked enveloping me in her food-perfumed breath. Intoxicated, I said, "Steak, medium rare and a buttered, baked potato." I expected this odd answer to end my reckless probing, but she only gazed into my eyes with a look of pure invitation. Effortlessly, I gathered all of her into my arms; she was as weightless as a five pound sack of potatoes. I took her to the large upper room furnished and prepared, ready for us. It was foolish. It was irresponsible. It was an act of raw emotion. But neither of us wanted to stop. For three years we had played by the rules, living delicate lives. We were hungry for each other. I tried to speak, but words were worthless. We spent the night wrapped together, discovering a forgotten knowledge of ourselves. With each deeper connection of our bodies, I tasted more. as I sucked the flavor out of every one of her pores, I could distinguish spices, yeast, humanity, and the unmistakable taste of something foreign and malevolent. She died with her lips on mine, my soul's last supper. I left the room with her body in it and escaped to the beach to watch the waves as they scoured the shore clean. I awoke, dazed from the dizzying dance of death,
to find my love half-spent. Rage shook my frail frame, that it should be spent thus, like a cheap coin carelessly tossed to a restless child with no cherishing warmth to hold onto it till the end. The child in a hurry to attend an illusionist's gathering slipped it into a pocket with no bottom. Caroming off the curb, rolling aimlessly until it hit the gutter and sputtered lifelessly into the smelly abyss. This is where I awoke to find the executioner near the sentence, neatly inked, in hand. love, despair, broken hearts
The final day that we would ever stand together, just you and I. Was it years ago or yesterday? Time has a way of warping like pressed wood abandoned to the wind and sun. I remember the dark sky dribbling out discontent in warm drops. We kept silent in our own space. While the world cried out to be noticed. I held your hand in mine. Your ride arrived first. We stood, and I felt so much with no words to say it. "I love you," you told me for the first time. I stopped breathing, and the world heaved. If ever I felt an "I love you" rip through me, it was yours. I wanted to a least echo the sentiment, but the language stuck in my throat, a rusty nail pinning my heart there. You smiled, pulled away from my grasp and disappeared. I took my train home and marveled at dinner after dinner till time had no purpose. Now, I wonder what would have happened on a platform long ago if I had said, "I love you, too. Stay with me?" Every night I stand alone on the razed playing fields
Waiting for you, the keeper of the night's white fire You promised to teach me all you knew of cooler nights and fiery noons Then I felt your frost-flecked wind as it shook the color out of the trees Clambering for entrance through my single pane i was helpless to stop my drowning But you silenced your fire and took society's view denouncing the unorthodox love we knew I've no stock in society's rules a tribute to raving ass-eared fools. fly flutter fall down
different dreams cause conflict flight impossible death plays coy once again keeping me from escape
from all the memories that bring nothing but pain. would be better to burn out like a roman candle up in flames, fast and furious without the wasting. wasting wasting wasting slipping further away into the blue-black veldt that hangs over the moon and stars of the my night. there, hidden behind it all, death laughs at struggles as inconsequential as mine, striping love and beauty from the bones until nothing remains but ichor. ugliness abounds in the modern age of here today off tomorrow to the next sparkling thing if only I could find a way to live as the others do, and bury myself alive in the process of becoming other. I'll take my sky blackened with traces of blue at the edges,
no scent of coming rain in the air because the rain already falls. A symphony of pitters and patters punctuated by the steady claps of thunder. There I can stand, sullen, lost yet somehow unafraid of crackling electric light that could just as easily escort me to a grave. Yes, I like standing in the rain because no one can claim the tears I cry. No end nor beginning that any human heart can discern between the water nature and I weep in a joint union of all that a tear can signify. wake up, set the sun on fire
it's time to go out again out into the bright darkness of the world. slip your scarred skin, like armor forged from all the bled-letting of love's embrace, carefully over the tender bones. make up your best face, the one with a hint of indifference and interest mixed in equal part to hold on the cut-out smile. advertise yourself - here is a heart ready again for anguish and despair - make yourself known in all the right circles. open the door, put a foot in front of the other it's time to go out again out into the darkly lit brightness of her world. i need to request a favor
no, not that you love me again, for i know that i cannot make that so i ask that you remember me i feel as though my life is being consumed, taken away bit by bit, soon nothing much will remain of me and i need to know that one person who knew me remembers me. |
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