A Fool

If the roses at the flower shop down the street from your house could speak, they’d tell a story of how they never found their way to me. They’d sigh in pain over my hands that didn’t get to caress their smell.

I’ve beaten myself up many nights over what I could have, should have, must have done right. Definitely done wrong.

But, this is no longer my fault and you are no longer mine to hold.

Lonely nights and busy days.

Night fall and darkness all around me as I waited for my phone to light up and my room to sense the spark of your midnight love, but it never came. I love you’s spewed from your mouth like water, with no actions to match. You were a boy, working hard to be the man you could be and I lent my hand, head, heart and soul to be your comfort through the storm. I walked through fire and became armour to your dreams.

Oh, what a fool I have been.

Long nights, frivolous fights, you were always ‘tired’ of me and my constant whirlwind of hurt.

‘Don’t be a child’, you said.

Now, questions swirl and the ‘drafts’ folder is piling up with words you will never read and heart songs you will never hear.

I still remember your smell, of cheap cigarettes and Old Monk, laced with the sweetness of your just-out-of-the-shower scent. Your smile that lit up my world and your laugh that brought out the innocence in mine.

Missing you has become second skin, being angry at you is still taking some getting used to.

You promised to love away my demons… Oh, what a fool I was for not seeing that you just wanted me to love away yours instead.

A sweet talker with eyes that make me fall softly in love over and over again. Hands that laid the foundation for every forever we could have had.

But those lips.

Lips to kiss away my every fear, lips that spewed lies to give birth to new ones. You’ve made a fool out of me too many times, you’ve sorryed away too many unnecessary jibes.

Practiced signatures on old tissue papers, dates noted and forevers put on a calendar made of dreams. 

Movie tickets in an old memory jar and your shirt tucked away in my closet, tucked away in a small corner of my heart.

Goodbyes are never easy and we had too many for me to count. But this last one, this painfully real and horribly prolonged one is going to cut deeper than anything that can be stitched up.

You promised… What a fool I have been. Oh, such a fool for you.

Laid To Rest

When we break down in shards and not in flowers, when we create a warzone and not a meadow, how can I still be stupid enough to wish for you?

When frustration replaces love and anger replaces joy, that is usually an indication to pack your bags and look for greener pastures. But, somehow the smell of you and the comfort of your arms are all I want… Or so I seem to believe.

Pungent what ifs and melancholic maybes are all we have left in this chess game of forbidden possibilities. You were the king, but you took my role as the queen too seriously. As days passed and I kept protecting you, I somehow lost my sense of self and my ability to be enough for me. What should have been an equal relationship suddenly turned into a one way street that sent me crashing into a reality that I never planned for.

Skin on skin, we created the only magic I’ve ever known. Forbidden kisses left on my hopeful lips while our fingers trace my every outline, I fell for you so deep with no harness to protect me. With no you at the end to catch me.

Like dew drops lay on barren leaves, your smell lingers on me after all this time. Your signature scent mixed so perfectly with the smell of freshly smoked cigarettes. Your skin tells a story that my soul is not willing to forget. No one can kiss these pained lips like you can, no one can fix and break me all at the same time, like you have.

Why?

The universe lets out a sigh every time our fingers touch or our smiles dance. Almost like it knows we’re about to create sin all over again. My mind says no and my body starts to tremble but for some reason my heart walks every path that could lead me back to you.

Why?

Eyes that have seen harshness and hands that can caress my every fear into comfort. Our worlds don’t fit but somehow I feel like our souls do. So easily you slid into my universe and changed its colors. So completely my eyes laid to rest what my heart already knew. Weeks have passed and long nights have gone by with me staring at my phone. That one call or one message, that one indication that I run through your mind just as much as you race through mine.

My love, you have changed my world. And as much as I never wanted to admit such failure or accept such helplessness, you have laced your being through my every thought, my every inch and I will never again be the same.