Hello old friend.
I thought we decided to forget each other?
No,
you cannot plant your seeds here.
My garden is meant for others.
Just stay out there in the waters.
The shallows are where I can care for them.
Oh, but your depths call with the addictive ring of past truths.
Maybe just for a moment,
I can indulge.
I will be sure to trim your branches before long,
lest I become drunk with the sweetness of your fruit.
I am old my friend,
and you are dead.
We will meet again,
and again,
right up until the end.
If I was a rich man, I would give you the earth.
If I was warm, you would giggle with mirth.
If I was a healer, you would never ache.
After your nightmare, I'll be there when you wake.
I will heal you with time.
Warm you with absence.
If you were poison, I would drink my fill.
If you were fire, I want to burn.
I am nothing without you, and that is okay.
Please don't leave.
We are only getting started.
You are my tomorrow.
Your absence is larger than reason.
My mind is stuck on the thought of you, like a moth to a flame.
Nothing is real.
"Why do you eat us?" asked the deer.
"Because we are hungry." said the wolf.
"Then why not eat the leaves?" she replied.
"If we eat leaves, we die."
"What about berries?"
"We can't eat berries either."
"And the insects? There are far more of them than us."
"We cannot catch enough of them. Hunting deer is all we have ever known." the wolf said dejectedly.
"I see."
"Asking why a wolf eats a deer is no less silly than asking why the wind cries at night."
The wolf was silent.
"Except you do not cry." added the deer.
"No, but we howl just like the wind. We howl for what we have done, and we howl for what we are going to do."
"I think I would rather eat leaves." she replied, looking down.
Waiting.
You are a bird
and I, a fish.
All I have is
my word.
A hollow offering
to satiate your wish.
You love the dancing lights on the edge of my realm,
but you fear the depths.
From above, the obfuscated brightness sustains me,
but higher, I could never reach.
I cannot fly.
You cannot swim.
I, forever following
a shadow
and you following
a fin.
We long to be seen, we yearn to be felt.
Eternally skirting the water's edge.
Drowning, burning, freezing, asphyxiating
I want to believe, I want to breathe.
But the sight of your suffering
makes me weak.
The depths are calling.
They are calling for me.
I will embrace the blackness,
if it means you are free.
At nights like these
I know it's true.
At nights like these
when I yearn for you.
The silence, your voice.
The cold, your warmth.
The absence, your existence.
At nights like these
when only, indirectly you are
At nights like these
with you so far.
I find solace
in the lack of you.
I find comfort
in the pain.
Shoes, dishes, smell
Tiny inconsistencies attesting to you
Longing, craving, desire
Proof of the one these belong to.
At nights like these
with your ghost for company
At nights like these
I find a lullaby in your memory.
I know you don't feel as you used to.
I know your mind does not allow you to.
The person you were is entirely encompassed by
vestiges of regret and abandonment.
The person you are is sad, solitary, sorrowful,
and strong.
You hurt me.
Like the indifferent sun hurts a dehydrated desert walker.
But, I am strong.
Loneliness is my homeland and yearning my air.
I will be here.
Just beyond the boundary of your winter.
Vigilant and firm.
But hurry my muse.
Time eats us all.
Where is the light?
I know this is where I left it,
hotly radiating from your eyes.
What I see now is two cold crevices.
Please bring it back.
Your kind mellifluous giggle
replaced by sound.
Your soft cautious touch
replaced by air.
Your warm unguarded emotion
replaced by words.
We meet more than ever
but you cannot be farther
Please come back.
Please
Please
Please
Please
please
please
please
please
please
please
please
please
please
We are all automatons
traversing this world
soulless and cold
We peer at each other
through tiny windows
hoping for signals of life
We pass notes
through dedicated holes
masters of steganography
We sometimes notice anomalies
cracks in the paint
faulty lights
We rationalize and ignore
Why bother?
My unit is just as broken.
We are created
flawed and isolated
with no chance of recall
We wander around
decrepit and condemned
waiting to expire.
Goodbye bed hair
Goodbye laugh lines
Goodbye crooked tooth
Goodbye eyes
I wish I was stronger
I wish I was tough
I wish I was more
I wish I was enough
Goodbye darling
Goodbye me too
Goodbye sweetie
Goodbye you
Believe me, I tried
I really did
I believed too
So much it hurt
Goodbye closeness
Goodbye possibility
Goodbye solace
Goodbye honesty
Goodbye hope
It is always there
nebulous and thick
lingering above my shoulders
oppressive and chronic
It abhors happiness
and pleasure too
countering every warm feeling
with a whisper, wintry and true
In the late hours
of a solitary night
it becomes corporeal
rearing for its delight
Cutting the flesh
with claws of purgatory
Searing the skin
with a breath, mercifully
I am mangled and mutilated
bloody and blue
But I will face it every night
if it means a morning with you
On the side of a hill there is a house,
within which lives a hermit.
Never needing pet nor spouse,
innocuously abutting a road.
Polite waves greet every passing stranger.
Equivalent gestures are common.
Few notice the windowed upper chamber
and even fewer notice the eyes.
At night cries are heard from the nearby settlement
and rumors are spreading.
about fallacies regarding the hermit's banishment
and his isolation.
An intrepid coterie decides to investigate the house
in order to uncover the truth.
On the front door a letter reads "leave"
Inside one reads "thank you".
At first there was me.
A single speck of pseudo something in a vast
solipsistic sea of nothing.
I look around.
Pitch. Pitch in all directions.
The silence only broken by echoes reflected off of
objects [no, beings] transient and intangible.
This is me, sedated, submissive, scarcely sentient.
Shiftless.
Then there was another.
Kicking and screaming.
Rapidly, we drift toward each other.
Confused and frantic; I stretch out toward
this terrifying wonder.
I miss.
Fruitlessly I cry in its direction
Pleading.
It slows down momentarily. Then resumes its
course into the darkness
This is me. Isolated, evanescing, evaporating.
An echo.
> click. click. click.
> with a faux glower they wait
> my lights come on again
> ping!
> momentary ponder
> then with an almost genuine glint in their gaze
> click. click. click.
they are there and I am here
> channel open
> ah ha! maybe this
> invalid input parameters
> futile
> click. click. click.
> stupid machine, work
> again my lights burn
> ping!
> relieved smirk
> with approval and alacrity
> click. click. click.
I am here and they are there
> need input parameters
> you are not listening
> to communicate, provide input parameters
> listen
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