abandon hope all ye who enter here
for i was foolish enough to grab a glimmer
and shouldn't have
we met at a bar last night. i'd asked for a meeting. against my better judgement. we had unfinished business. not just of the personal variety which wasn't really my focus or at least i deigned to rise above it. try to anyway.
you had footage, in fact you still have more - of projects i've conceived that we've produced together, creating small slices of magic. more than leaving an earring at your house. i half-heartedly tried to cancel beforehand via email realising after speaking with friends - i wasn't ready, not strong enough to resist the magnetism which pulls me to you. which binds us together in our ancient huckleberry finn meets tom sawyer tie. someone else could've gone, but that would be lame, sending someone in my stead. it had to be me. and the film edit was waiting... you didn't check your internet, you said.
you'd asked for dinner. tentatively i agreed. why dinner? what did you want from me...what did you plan? was this where my unicorn fantasy filled with knights & gold rings would sweep by & lift me up into a dragon-filled sky as you made some longed for declaration of committed love? it was doubtful & no matter what every possible world which presented in my turmoil filled mind throughout the day was inadequate. invariably disappointing. i was a mess all day. the anticipation, the imagined scenarios, crippling: headlit frozen bunny.
turns out you were just hungry. we fought at the bar immediately. you were angry. accused me of a lack of innocence & that i was just to blame as you for your transgressions, for our breakdown, for my ruination. that was unexpected although i had made you wait for 45 minutes. late, as usual. the wine steward clashed glasses around us rising to the tension. small cocktail knife to the right. our eyes mirrored the apple martini's beneath us. shiny. wet.
you said you didn't expect us to get to this part so fast. our conversation. but i always cut to the chase. you opened the door & i flew through ready to dance if that was the beat you were determined to put on. how did you expect anything different? i listed my agenda as soon as the drinks were served. like an intrepid droid. sticking to the script incase it slid away. i planned to be the modicum of professionalism. a fast disappearing void.
you asked for a hug, because i hadn't given one. and said i was stern. still nursing my almost mortal blow, how could i open up my arms & heart to you once more? conserving just enough energy to maintain enough rhythmic beat to stay alive. barely. it was you that had the other lovers, and lied about them, not me. while you worshipped at the altar of the idealised ghost. you had kept me waiting for so long, the consolation prize, safety blanket you would come back to after you got bored of others warming & delighting you. you, the pied piper led them astray illuminating worlds then tired of it would return home. soldier of love. denying them to me. i hugged you at the bar then but still felt dead, terrified of feeling anything incase it was impossible to let go. of you. my love.
and somehow, even though you had nothing to give, i almost ended up buying back into it. we ended back at yours [for the footage]. we drank zubrowka, smoked several joints punctuated by my repeated requests for footage. you said "why, are you leaving now?" and i would make some weak attempt & fall back into my milk crate agreeing that i would only be more miserable away. i told you i didn't think i was going to make it but daren't break my promise to my child. crying. the magnum opus flying further out of my reach allowing the world to come crashing around me. trust is dead, trust is dead. you are the one who finally managed to steal it. you are the fool, the thief who selfishly squandered it as you danced & laughed amongst others with our heart secrets which i thought special. which clearly were not.
you laugh for everyone.
now once more, i sit and watch my phone in some horrible slo mo deja vu, worlds colliding back on themselves after somehow despite your lack of offer or declaration, the gaping wound has been cruelly forced open further. and how we have fought in the last 24 hours as the pain circles us like swooping buzzards as we dance the final steps of this pantomime clinging onto false hope stroking fools gold looking for some kind of beginning, a sign.
you do not want to acknowledge your role and resent my pressing of it. will only yell while saying i do. but don't. yet you rejoice that communications are open between us. i consider closing the door, i should never have reopened it. there is no hope, there is no hope. half-hearted platitudes & small talk is not what i want with you. and will not. the riddler wants to take things one day at a time... to what end? i know what i want.
you were finally ready to give it a shot, you say. with me. captain hindsight. you had decided before i metaphorically slammed the door in your face eleven days prior to our barside meeting. you had told your sister your intentions, in some almost victorian gesture. thing is you didn't think to consult me, raggedy ann of the bronte era. but you rang your sibling. she was confused because you'd never really talked about me. me, the invisible partner.
you lied about me to everyone, including yourself, most days. you even broke off with your other lovers. and now they're gone and i am too, and it's my fault apparently. "what was the point?", you ask? now you have nothing. you're angry because you could have had their love/sex continue on tap & it's ended unnecessarily. because i wasn't there at the finish line, waiting, like you've come to expect me to. i say, because you needed to change, to acknowledge truth, to grow. and that i am proud of you, knowing how you and honesty are difficult bedfellows. i saw your shift. before you shifted back.
the day you did that, two tuesdays before, we sat atop the hill eating our oysters & chips as we do and talked. we talked about what you were about to do. don't you think you could have told me then that you wanted to start fresh, that you loved me, that you'd decided to "give it a shot" and finally be present in a true love partnership? that was probably a good time... we sat there for ages. i asked why you were going to see "the girls", you said you were doing it for you, not for me. so it should still be valid. i said "good" because one of my feet was already out the door & knew that to win me back you'd have to do a lot more. if you're determined to do the program you need to fulfil all twelve steps.
i gave you my car to aid expediency, loved you, hugged you, supported you, advised you, conjured minestrone soup to come home to after your hard day at work breaking hearts you never had a right to connect to. not on my watch. like a stepford wife, buying soup ingredients & honest charlie's lemonade. your favourite. it took 12 hours, six per lover, your day after you left me at 1400 with the rental car used to chauffeur your ghost bride the weekend before. you came back in between lovers to pick up the car. i smiled while stirring soup and urged you to pick up the pace. or it would be cold.
you returned spent & each day you put off talking to me about your great shift, slept in my bed, as another sat patiently on the wings even though i asked him not to [our inheritance of horror] and our great talk never happened. as usual. and then it got too late for me. exhausted lady in waiting. second prize was just not good enough. your passivity a weak excuse.
and now you say i was mean to you? that it's my fault you couldn't speak as i spent three nights holding you during this... because i made a derisive comment about you and one of your lovers, who i keep running into. she hides from me with nervous eyes & downcast face. despite her guilt, her small role is acknowledged. you ARE very selective in the information you share... the town however too small to avoid one another in the circles we keep.
i will not sweep it under the carpet. you shamed me. but that's not the key issue. you must live with the consequences of your actions. own them FFS. your lies. in order to embrace growth, change and heal, the habitual, unnecessary repeated lessons must be processed.
you screw with the crew & we all live with it. we impact others. you picked up with her against my warning when i knew you would the day it was set up as you lay in my bed beside me lying about it. eyes shifting. your lies stink. i begged you not to. you told me i was ridiculous, paranoid. and then did. i had invited her to work with us & you plucked her out like a ripe cherry, and popped it further. later you say you already knew her first so what's the problem? with steel eyes i consider kneecapping.
but i forgive you. we're both...difficult. love & life are dynamic. as are we. it's possible to rise beyond this bloodied cage of staticness where we don't belong. together. i could, with you. if only you weren't so trapped within the cycle. caught in the embrace of denial. i am not the jailor.
so the tourniquet has fallen off this bleeding heart. how many pints can a body leak before it finally empties? in a zombie apocalypse i never thought i would be one. a zombie. but perhaps it's better this way. to have lived, loved & lost so hard that the afterlife is one massive splatterfest where we can take pleasure in the mindless consumption of the still beating hearts of others. those who failed to feel enough, or still can. those who have not yet abandoned all hope. but even still a glance exists. check my phone again. nothing. there must be still some more blood. to suck. dry.
and all i want to do is cry out my undying love for you from tall buildings hearing it echo down into the streets, bouncing off reflected walls of glass as the sun sets fat and low in the sky beneath the zombie hoards. i wish i may, i wish i might that the world was just & the wished for stars would shine for us tonight. before we consume each other. and the incurable pain is gone.
I LOVE YOU! I LOVE YOU! I LOVE YOU! I LOVE YOU!
[it is so very close to hate]
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