He Held My Heart In His Hands And Asked Me Why It Broke

I want to learn to love like you

I got good at leaving; but I'm asking you to stay.

These words have been with me for so long they aren't easy to say.

I'm afraid if I speak them to the empty air there won't be anything left of me.

I haven't tried before; I just watched them leave.

So I'm hoping this time, if I give these words to you.

You'll take their place in my chest and say you love me too.

There are hands on my hips and I dread where they might go; cold and calloused and full of intent.

They inch up instead along my ribs; crawling and scraping against my skin.

Under my sternum they begin to dig; slicing deep with sharpened nails.

They stab and burrow deep in my chest; hands pressed in prayer barely brush my heart.

They snap my bones when they pull apart; prying me open to hungry eyes.

Yet still, I beat for their entertainment; exposed and bleeding and no longer me.

You pluck out old bones from your body like errant thought; dropping them carelessly to the ground.

They crunch and crack under thick black boots; crumbling to dust.

And you sigh as if this change and growth in yourself is tedious and detached as the pruning if a bush.

Cutting away stray branches with the sickening crack of bone.

Brushing them away with the sweep of your hand as if these pieces never came from you; they aren't of use.

And I wish at once to be as numb and strong as you.

That sobering moment when you are brushed by death. Only by proxy; a tragedy twice removed.

But you see different, taste different, feel different.

Confronted by the fragile state that is humanity. When death is more than just mortality and morbidity.

Floating without even grief to hold your heart. Unbroken and unsure.

I can only scream my feelings through the open window of a moving car

When the wind steals the words from my lips and smothers them before they can be heard

I'm good for love

A fertile plot for it to claim. It springs to life under my feet. It drips and curls down from my fingertips. Its roots in my every thought.

I love colors and sunsets. White fluffy clouds. Boys and girls. Friends and strangers. The texture of cotton. Hot steam and cool stream water. Eyes and arms and noses. Hands and hearts and shoulders. Fresh baby kittens and sun-soaked kitchens. Me and you and them.

Love grows up my arms like new grass sprouts. Tangles around my ankles like thorny vines. Grows thick in my chest like moss. It's suffacating

I'm good for love but love isn't good for me.

I was never meant to have a body.

My tethered little pet.

So much responsibility to look after.

So much washing and clothing and tucking away.

I was never meant to rot so slowly.

From diseases, I will never know.

So much tending to my body needs.

So much aching and soothing and drugging away.

I was never meant to hold it's hand.

Like a mother holds a child.

So much guarding it needs.

So much hiding and cherishing and giving away.

I was never meant to have a body.

When worlds collide they do so violently.

Crashing together with a destructive passion.

They set fire to each other and are burnt up in the process.

But what is left in their wake is what we live for.

Your past is no excuse for your future