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Arrogant irreverence to the facts and

writing the rules with invisible ink.

Set up for the mess up and 

I have no one else to blame.

Sweeping my soul’s floor with

blasphemous strokes of irretrievable

Rhetoric, I blew it, you knew it but 

You let me fall.

You said it was for my own good-

that big knot forming on my head.

Sometimes humility is found 

in the lowest of places and

so, I visit and stay awhile.

My recovery was not what I expected. 

I healed but still bear the scars.

The lessons are etched on the lonely

places in my heart.

Humiliated I sneak back home where

things have changed but you have not.

I’m ready to clean house, make room, 

and begin again.

Photo credit: Snapavelli for Nappy.com

DO YOU LOVE ME?

 

Ripping my heart from my chest I held it out offering it, still beating to you. Reluctantly, you took it from my hand and set it on the table.

Stunned, I watched you blankly stare back at me as if to say, “And?”

I thought the gift needed no explanation yet there you were…waiting. I glanced at the beating, dying organ on the table; each beat slower than the one before. You didn’t give a shit! I wanted you to give a shit. You shrugged; it wasn’t your heart after all what did it really matter? I wanted it to matter.

My eyes fluttered because that’s what the truth does; it makes your eyes flutter. Second looks don’t change the truth. My heart was the sacrifice to prove that I loved you.

Crazy how I thought that yanking my heart from my chest was all I had to do to hear you say, “I love you,” in return. Your lips remained still; no words uttered on behalf of my dying heart.

I wanted you to love me, but you didn’t; you couldn’t. Yanking my heart from my chest was just another futile act of suicide I’d played over and over, and my heart was the victim.

Love does nothing but leave hearts on the table, the spoils of foolishness. There you stood still, standing boldly in my face waiting for the answer to the question in your eyes, “And?”

Funny, I realized that I was begging for love from someone that wouldn’t even speak. Wouldn’t part his lips to say what he really felt. My heart was on the table and there was a gaping hole in my chest and I was DYING to hear the words, “I love you.”

Even as my heart continued to slow, I waited as you watched me in silence; mocking me with your stare of, “And?”

“Do you love me” I asked tearfully?” I so desperately needed to hear the words before my heart stopped beating. I remembered not so long ago, feeling so special when you kissed me. But I wasn’t the first or the only that you had kissed, and I wanted to be I wanted to be special!

“Do you love me?” I asked again.

You took a step closer our bodies nearly touching. Simultaneously, our eyes turned toward the table watching the heart as it beat ever so slowly. I prayed silently that the sight of my heart would give you the courage to speak the words I needed to hear.

“Do you love me?” I asked, perhaps you hadn’t heard me before. Then you turned, looked deeply into my eyes and with a stern quiet voice you asked, “Do you?”

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AND THEN MORNING CAME

 

It was late.

The entire week had passed, and you hadn’t said a word.

You came and went as if I wasn’t there even as you grazed your shoulder against mine.

Our son was the witness…seeing how the only man he knew treated a woman.

This was your expression of love toward his mother…and mentally he took notes.

Then it was midnight on the seventh day, and you were ready to speak. 

So of course, you expected that I was too.  After all, the baby was down

the dishes done, and the laundry neatly folded in its place.

You’d mastered the art of saying a lot without really saying a thing.

You talked, I nodded and when you were finished, I noticed your bags packed and sitting in the dark corner near the door.

Your house key glistened on the table. I hadn’t noticed it before.

Perhaps the finality of your announcement made everything brighter.

“I’ll be back for the rest of my things,” You said.

I thought about the fact that you had convinced me to quit my job only days before

and we had to eat.  Your son needed diapers…milk…

It was odd that you had not mentioned those things in your ramblings.

“This time it’s you not me.” You said proudly happy to finally have the last word.

I saw you stuff the checkbook in your back pocket and the extra cash that we kept in the cabinet above the sink.

You thought of everything, except…

You forgot that I was strong. That I had been a survivor long before we’d met.

You forgot that you weren’t the beginning or the end of my world…just a part.

I knew love was never anything you understood or recognized.  

You wanted to be uncomfortable, angry, and so I was happy

that you had at last succeeded at something. 

And then it was morning. There was a knock at the door. It was Joy!

Photo credit: Sid Sun for Unsplash

DECEPTION

I stood at the sink facing the mirror terrified at the unfamiliar face looking just as terrified back at me.  It had been a long while since the two of us had spoken to one another.

Looking ahead and bending down I tried desperately to wash the taste of last night’s truths from my mouth. The bitter taste like the leftovers from a heavy meal had thickly coated my tongue and I used it as an excuse not to speak. 

I continued to look I hated what I saw had always hoped of being more still I wanted nothing to do with the truth.  What had I done to find myself here, alone, and disgusted? There was nothing to say.

Apologies seemed so vain; so futile, such a waste of time.  Yet, I needed to speak the words, I owed you that much.  I struggled to look again at you, still a stranger, still demanding answers from me.  “I’m sorry!” There just a whisper but the slight flinch told me that you’d heard.

“I’m sorry.” A little louder this time.  You didn’t believe it, neither did I since I was never one to apologize. Never one to back down or step up…it was a fact, my fact. My truth right there in front of me and I couldn’t deny it.

I’ve treated you poorly. I was supposed to be your best friend and you mine. I denied you and mistook you for the enemy shooting first and watching you fall dead at my feet. “Please forgive me!” I shouted, and my tears filled the sink before me.  Blood and tears, tears, and blood…mine, yours, ours.

I faced you the terror fading but still present. I saw the slight relief on your face too.  This had been long overdue, and it felt good to talk again.  I love you and I need you now more than ever to be my sister, my confidante, and my best friend…again.

Let’s keep in touch.

Photo credit: JD Mason for Unsplash

 

BUCKET-DIS

 

You’ve dropped your dreams in a bucket, covered them with dust, and doubt and time. Now it’s time to dig and pull them by the roots from that damp, dark place that has long been forgotten because fear has distracted you and made you forget that you had ever dreamed at all.

Photo credit: Photo by Pedro Da Silva on Unsplash