Rocks and Shoeboxes

Sometimes I wish the past were tangible,

That I could condense it into a little pebble,

Because, call me sentimental, but the past is something

I’d like to pick up and put in my pocket,

To carry close at hand while I search for a future.

Yes, I’d like to carry my past, stoic and unyielding,

The rock that grounds me,

Around in my pocket for the rest of my life,

So that when I’m scared I could hold it

And remember how I felt the first time he held my hand,

So I could run my fingers across it

And be reminded of how I used to run my hand through your hair,

So I could feel the comfort of every person I have ever loved

With simply the flick of a wrist.

I want the past to be a pebble that fits in the palm of my hand,

And I don’t ever want to let it go.

Because if the past were my pebble,

Then I wouldn’t have been shell-shocked at finding a shoebox full of your old letters,

Because I’d already be carrying around all that joy and all that pain,

I wouldn’t have been brought to tears as I re-read each one,

And it wouldn’t have hurt to throw them away.

If the past were containable and restrainable,

Then mere things couldn’t bridge gaps between years.

And maybe life wouldn’t hurt so much,

If we could hold everything we’ve ever had at one time,

If even the things we’d lost we still held onto.

Though, when you think about it,

The things we’ve lost are the things we hold onto most dearly:

Case in point, this box of letters,

Which it pained me to throw away.

An emotional packrat, I’d already been carrying around all that joy,

And, masked in it, all that pain…

Finding them just brought it out of hiding.

Then and there I realized I wouldn’t want a pebble:

There wouldn’t be room to breathe in between past pleasures and past pains,

Life’s ups and downs would cancel one another out,

Leaving a rather drab straight line.

Maybe living with the past is just as bad as living in it.

We can’t ever have a solid future if the tiniest hint at our past

Reduces me to tears.

And there’s no good without the bad,

So I have to let it all go.

I took a deep breath and overtuned the shoebox into the trash can,

Let out one last sob and closed the lid.

I don’t want to be a rock—

Things that cannot change cannot endure.

I can remember when we sung to one another,

But the sweetest song is the one we haven’t yet heard:

For the first time, I’m going to be brave enough to let

Possibility win out over familiarity.

It’s time to start something new.

The Day We Almost Kissed

Just do it! screams a voice in my head

Here we are, saying goodbye,

And you’re holding me just a little closer

Than just anybody else might

And honestly, I’d miss my bus in a heartbeat

If it meant I could stay here in your arms.

Here we are, all wrapped up in one another’s arms,

And as you run your hands up and down my back,

I think back to a few hours ago,

When those same arms were around my waist,

And I wonder what it means:

Anything? Everything? Nothing at all?

I wonder what this perfect day has meant

And I wanna do it so badly

That I have to bite my lips to keep them to myself.

I can hardly control myself:

I want to kiss you.

In fact, in this moment, it’s as if I

Planned this entire trip just to get to this exact second,

When I could tilt my head slightly and we’d be kissing.

But what if you don’t feel the same?

What if this fun daytrip was just a fun day?

Our friend rolls her eyes at the fact that we’re still entwined

-I’d forgotten we had an audience-

So I guess it’s put up or shut up time.

I relax my shoulders like I’m going to let you go

(A test of sorts)

And you pass with flying colors,

Somehow managing to pull me back and hold me even tighter.

I bury my face in your neck,

My favorite spot to kiss,

And having remembered that we’re being watched,

I dare not stop biting my lips.

I almost wished I could see your face

So I could try to guess what was running through your mind

But on second thought, I was scared to know.

So one last squeeze and goodbye entity

You’re once again you and I’m once again me,

And, equipped with schedules, tickets, and newly-minted memories,

To our lives we must return.

I pretended I could still see you as the wheels got to turning,

And that voice from before,

My heart? got to yearning…

And now we’re off in different directions,

And I count the days til we meet again,

Already labeling this as the day we almost

Became more than just friends,

The day you almost knew how I felt,

The day we almost kissed.

Loving and Leaving

My stepdad used to find himself fucking hilarious

And one of his favorite jokes was to say,

When someone had hurt themselves in some small way,

“Well how about I stomp on your foot?

“Then you’ll forget about whatever else was hurting you.”

I never thought he was funny,

But I think the concept could be used for joys as well as pains.

And I think they lied when they said,

“Absense makes the heart grow fonder.”

For the first few days, more or less,

An absense reigns much more present than a presence,

Missing someone takes the reigns, takes over your life,

And you let yourself sink lower than low.

Til one day you get up, dust yourself off, and resolve that

“Well, at any rate, life must go on.”

And go on it does.

You seek out your nearer friends and loved ones

Who, by being nearer, instantly become dearer,

And they distract you from the hole in your heart so well

That you’d think they had filled it in.

My stepdad thought a big hurt could mask a small one,

I say that a big joy can obscure a huge pain,

And you can let yourself be happy,

Remember how it feels to laugh and smile…

This charade can last for quite a while…

For however long it takes for you to see

The face of the one who had to leave.

Until you hear their voice.

Until they appear close enough that you could reach out and touch them

And you do,

And as your arms slide around one another,

The whole weight of missing them comes rushing back to you,

Knocks you over like an ocean wave,

And you never want to let them go again.

But this fondness resulted from reunion,

Not from the separation itself.

The heart grows weary of focusing on absense,

And love, even from others,

Is a hell of a distraction from pain.

I’d been having such a great time without you

That I’d forgotten how amazing every day with you is.

I can’t believe I never realized how much I miss you,

I never realized til you were right where

All along, I’d wanted you to be:

Til you had your arms around me.

I think the only thing they were right about is that

“Parting is such sweet sorrow.”

But, though I miss you now, in the end,

I guess we part only to meet again.

The String that...Saved Me?

A manipulator.

That’s what a marionette’s puppeteer is called.

A perfect name for whoever is pulling my strings,

Hidden behind the curtain of my life’s stage, unseen,

In this theatre disguised as my entire world,

I dance when she feels like dancing,

And if he has something better to do,

I lay limp on the floor, crying from the fall.

People come into and out of my life,

Pulling my strings and generally jerking me around.

Who are my friends but the sutradharas,

Wire-pullers, gods of my own little world?

Sometimes I feel it’s the only way we can interact.

Without them, what could I do but lie still on the ground?

I’m incapable of standing my own ground,

Making my own decisions…

I literally need you to move me.

How else could it be?

I once thought they were the strings that would save me,

But these cords that have strung me up,

These ties seem so natural I barely feel them anymore.

My will is indistinguishable frrom your own.

A pawn at your mercy,

I once had dreams of nodding my own head,

Moving my own feet,

Doing things on my own,

Being a real girl,

Pulled by sinew, not by string.

I once had dreams…

Or were they memories?

The Love of My Life: Take Two

We ended.

It was over.

This relationship,

This strange and unexpected love,

The last seven years,

We looked back only to let go.

We ended it,

And, with it, my world,

And you remained remarkably emotionless,

As if it hadn’t meant anything at all.

I guess if seven years had taught you anything,

It was never to believe me the first time around.

Because the words that came out of my mouth,

The “I’m done,

I love you, but I can’t do this anymore…”

They were no match for this hole in my heart.

I knew even then that whether “best” applied or not,

You’d always be the greatest love of my life.

A good friend of mine once told me

That while life may be called some crazy things,

It really just runs in circles,

And if we wait long enough,

We’ll end up with everything we missed.

When you showed up at my store [by chance?],

The gasp, the smile, the desire I had to throw myself at you,

Latch on and stay there for all eternity…

It told me she was right.

I’d spend some time without you

Completely without you,

Had gone through “I can’t live like this,”

“I think I can do this,”

And even gotten to the part where I didn’t miss you every day.

But I would still talk about you in daily conversation

Because everything reminded me of you

And in boredom, I reserted to you…

As I think you did to me,

For boredom brought us baby-stepping our way back to one another:

The world is full of wondrous things,

But nothing as familiar as you and me.

So now we talk a day or two a week,

Catching up with one another’s lives,

Trying to become again something like we once were…

Or maybe trying to become something new?

Trying to let it come naturally again

And maybe we’ll get back to that place where we didn’t have to try

Maybe we won’t

But I’m glad we’re in a place where we can try.

I’m still learning the boundaries,

Testing the waters of an ocean I know so well,

Going slow because I don’t want to fuck this up again

“Ex” is such an ugly prefix anyway:

Thanks for giving me the chance to have a second chance.