Almost Husband

You will always be my husband. 
I will always see home when I look at your face, 
you will always hold that place in my heart, 
a life left behind, 
the dreams we made 
and the children we wanted. 
We spent our days wondering
 and wishing so hard 
that I feel like it all happened.
I know the version with our happy ending,
the one I couldn't seem to make work in reality. 
The once upon a time 
where we had the perfectly us wedding
 and the three messy babies. 
The happily ever after
 where we retired to a pie shop
 with a crust rooftop 
and danced when no one was watching. 
A lifetime of happiness 
will exist for us in my mind for all time. 
Our future that could have, 
but wouldn't ever be.

I'm Sorry...

Your reassurance is useless,
It will never measure up
No matter what you do
Or say
Or think
It can't compete 
With my guilt.

Dread.

How my stomach sinks
My flesh turns cold 
My shoulders hunch
As I try to shrink
Right out of existence...

The pebble of your anger
To me is a mountain
Expanding exponentially
In the distance between your brain
And my heart

One small word,
an indication of imperfection:
"Wrong"
Can rock my world

What should be a tiny twinge
Of disappointment
Festers within me

It never leaves
Every last moment
Of embarrassment

Every misstep
Every incorrect answer,
Mispronounced word,
Misinterpreted gesture,
Misguided attempt to pursue something more…

Every moment
I feel it
I carry it with me
Every day

It is the knots in my back
the pouch of fat around my middle
the oversized sweater 
that i desperately
wrap around my body,
an attempt to envelope myself
in black fabric
hide my shameful self from the world


Every unkind word
Is burned into my brain
and my flesh
Every affection spurned
I remember it all

I try to push it down and never let it escape
But no container can hold all of these secret bits of me

They bubble to the surface
And wash over me in waves
Of twenty year old shame
The regrets of a 4 year old child
Who looked in the mirror
And saw nothing but a monster
The girl who turns beet red
Through brown skin
Clinging desperately
To the hope that one day
Maybe one day
She can be perfect
And all of this shame can be erased

I dream of perfection
Because perfection is my only escape
I dream of perfection
Because it is the freedom
From a world I never wanted to see
I dream of perfection
Because I just can't take much more reality
I need a fucking break
But how do you take a break from yourself?

This is what depression feels like
This is my anxiety everyday
Wondering who can see these bits
And pieces
And mistakes
Wondering if they will hate me
As much as I do
Wishing they would care for me
Protect me
In ways my parents never did or could
Wanting to be good enough
Even though good enough is never enough for me

The Problem With Romance As We Know It

The problem with romance as we know it is that it is built around figures like Jane Austen and John Keats. Both brilliant writers, genius really and deserving of our devotion to their work, but neither lived up to their position as romantic icons. John Keats two-timed Fanny Brawne who roamed the hills draped in black mourning him far longer than she knew him. The man she loved so dearly wrote the first draft of Bright Star, his most famous gift to Fanny, about Isabella Jones. One of the most beautiful love poems in history is little more than recycled words. Now for Austen, the mother of the modern romantic expectation - for ladies aren't you all looking for your Darcy?  Well, as gifted as she was, Austen had little experience. A brief, chaste flirtation with Tom Lefroy and a day long engagement to a man she could never love are the only romantic credits to Austen's life. Though they write beautiful words, who are these figures to decide for future generations what love and romance should look, sound and feel like? These are the figures that we have given the highest authority over love, but what did they really know? They are idealists who never attained their romantic goals. Their love went unrequited, though not unreciprocated. Are we doomed to fail under this idealized form of love? I believe that it encourages the hopelessness of the hopeless romantic. We put so much effort and attention to the yearning and struggling. We place great respect on the act of pining away sickened with our overflow of emotion. But where does this get us? Surely heartbreak is the only place this type of love can lead. If the grand gestures and desperate cries of the lovelorn are what we aspire to we will never reach satisfaction. That is the problem with romance as we know it. Romance doesn't need to be so grand. It doesn't need to be so tortured. Romance can live in all of the tiny moments that we so often take for granted. A great love story is really, when you think about it, in the telling. It's in the minute details and flourishes. Then again what do I know? I'm no better than Keats or Austen. I'm just a once-loved girl who gave up a contentedly-ever-after story. An insomniac piecing together how we all came to know about love. My conclusion is that we would be much happier if we stopped worshipping the torture of it all, being unnecessarily tortured does not make us any greater.   Love doesn't need to be quite so tragic. Love can be simple and it can be kind. It may not make for good drama but it makes for good lives. That's what I want my romance to be, a free and happy life.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Remember that I Loved You

Remember that I loved you
Right up to your dying day
Remember how I looked at you
That it was too much for me to say

Remember how I held your hand
Remember my smiling lips
Remember all my parts and pieces 

Remember all of this
Remember that I wrote for you
And hoped for you
And sang for you

Remember how I loved you
And that you will be sorely missed.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone