Storybook Ending

Even sleeping beauty woke up one day
to find her fairytale ended.
the part after "happily ever after"
not so happy
and longer than ever after.
prince charming now king chauvinist
rimmed with a rose rainbow
falls into bed, slovenly.
spent by gluttonous debauchery.
the moment when everything started
to stop
just whispered by.
over half a life.
youth goes un-paused
and age, like good deeds,
never goes unpunished.
in a lapse of acceptance,
she finds herself wishing
she'd gone right back to bed in the first place.

Epilogue

he left today.
an amicable parting.
but this one filled with less sweetness. more sorrow.
headed west, he said,
to escape the ghost of my memories,
the sounds of it's shackles clinking,
the white noise behind everything else
clattering around in his mind.
I couldn't hold him here,
that would be evil
and injust considering...

the light in the morning is clear
a good day to start fresh.
I think.
but the first points of permutation
haven't yet peeked through
from behind their cloud,
and the warmth has yet to spread,
to fill the space that he's left
where, for months, all the cold has been held.

I was shivering, standing infront of the stove.
cooking the last meal
I ever would for him.
wiping tears in the crook of my elbow
that didn't have the onion excuse.
finding out the amount is infinite
to the tears that one can shed
over love in all its forms.
as ours had transmuted,
from friend to lover and back again
until we could no longer face each other
without the doubt put in by remembering
all those shades and phases of grey.
so how can I be expected to so easily say goodbye
remembering the gradient of our romance
and our friendship
a decade of being on a sliding scale
where love is never black or white.
I can never be in love or out of love
just somewhere in between
but that middle ground isn't good enough
and still I know that I can't hold him here
when he's feeling like he has to leave.

my parting gift is the excess of my love
folded into the pancake batter
that which he never felt as much as I had tried to show
my secret ingredient,
to make up for my failures
is bittersweet.
a third of my life, of his,
needs the memory wiped away.
the sad hope is that one day
we'll meet again.
as strangers.
with a vague recollection of heartache
and loss
and a greater sense of the fact that
while people are imperfect
love itself is not.

Living with the Ex

And I don't mean just the memories.
He's here.
Right now.
Sleeping in the other room.

cremation

there is nothing left to this.

it's the hardcover fairytale
i ripped the skin off
and burned the pages of.

currently
the authors name disintegrates
as ash into earth
into wind.

no words left to read.
no pictures left to see.
no story to tell.

sadly
i will save
the stark remains
in a figurative urn
without a lid
accepting the mist of memories
that still envelops me sometimes.

here, now,
he is the last thing on my mind
as i try to reach sleep and forget at the same time.

there's an arrow in my ass cheek and i find it mildly irritating...(scratch that...very irritating...)

i love the idea of you, the idea of me
but the reality is so much different
it's not like a gift given
where it's the thought that counts
words and actions hold too much weight.
the insanity of love
heightened when you're around
is not equal
to the ache
of dealing with your absence
when you can't be found.
I could try to justify it
every time the thought of you jumps up
and i push it away,
like i'm trying right now.
but it's not worth the effort.
so few love stories ever are.
everything comes down
to two psuedo rationalizations.
i'm lazy
and i'm scared,
and i'm not evolved enough
to take any of the blows that you could deal me
and deal with them any less than indignantly.
forgive me.
i'm too weak
to reach
true vulnerable state.
and even if i ever do
i might never do it gracefully.
detachment and fragile pride
vacillating their emotional aftertastes
between shattered self-esteem
and inflated ego
aren't conducive
to cupid's efforts.
but hey,
at least he still tries.
(that mischievous bastard.
i wish he'd find something better to do with his time.)

halcyon state

my necklace is swinging in pulses on my chest
cause and effect of the rhythm of my heartbeat
where the silver lays across my jugular
hanging taut with gravity
the only movement in this moment
the rest laced in stillness
elbow on thigh
arm raised to meet lowered forehead
hand crooked like Atlas
to hold the weight
of the world
in my head.
the beautiful angle
symbol of a beautiful decline
yet still,
while still,
zen state is unapproachable.
thoughts like an elephant graveyard
a place they ceremoniously went to die
but encased in the remnants
are the memories of when they were still alive.
neurons fire
a pattern is recognized
as they are, i am
still.
alive.