Sometimes when Lalita isn't here or when she and I are sharing a particularly emotional moment, images and sensations from my past float to the surface. I deeply appreciate my abilities to think and feel deeply, but sometimes I see them as a burden and a curse. And then the introspection begins. It's always better when she's there, because there's another mind, another soul to think and feel alongside mine. But then there are those times when she can't be, and I've got to be okay on my own. Trust me, I'm no stranger to loneliness.
A boy alone so far from home
Endless rooftops from my window
I felt the gloom of empty rooms
And rainy afternoons
It's a kind of semi-comfortable solitude that I've been coming to terms with ever since I endured those long, dark nights in the wake following the collapse of my first real relationship. It actually stretches even further back, back to the times I spent alone writing up posts on my old Xanga late at night in my senior year at high school. So I've been here before. I know it's a place that I'll still visit frequently. Allowing myself to become familiar with loneliness is quite similar to how I'll revisit painful memories. Doing this keeps me keenly aware of my emotional state. I can accurately measure my happiness because I know my position on the spectrum. I believe in the coexistence of dark and light. Joy and sadness. Rain and sun. Summer and winter. Love and pain, most of all. Though we may file all these concepts into binaries, it's only so we can reduce them into comprehensible, bite-sized pieces for our limited human brains and relate them in the flawed systems of language. We have such a tenuous hold on reality.
As you should be able to predict by now, I of course will resort to grappling with these heavy and unwieldy things with the awkward tools of language. And that leads to writing. It's always helped me. So far I haven't lost hold of my sanity, so there's evidence that this still works.
Just this past weekend, Lalita went out with a friend and left me alone in the apartment where I contended with my thoughts as I always do. And this is the result. I appreciate your reading this.
____________________________________________________________________________
Pieces of
You
19
April 2016
In
this world
It
may seem ridiculous
To
hold on to anything at all.
But
here I am
In
this place,
Not
too far from you
And
what we used to have.
In
my pockets I still carry
Those
movie tickets from the early days,
Those
urgent emails,
Those
letters you wrote to me when we were apart,
Those
hairpins you wore to work,
Those
ashes and cigarette butts,
And
all those long and thoughtful texts.
I
should say goodbye,
Turn
around and walk away,
But
you know me better than that.
Instead,
I'll hold on
To
the things you left behind,
Evidence
of your existence
In
my life.
In
this time
It
may seem pointless
To
remember anything at all.
But
here you are
In
my mind,
Not
all that long ago,
Living
again and again like it was just yesterday.
In
my memory you are still
Wearing
that little yellow hoodie,
Moving
gracefully on top of me with your hips,
Listening
to the music of the spheres,
Pinning
me against the wall with your lips,
Raining
your toxic hatred down on my heart,
And
reaching out to hold my hand for the first time.
I
should pack up
All
these images and sensations,
Send
them into the abyss and forget--
But
these memories are much too strong.
Despite you and me and what's expected of us,
I'll
cherish and preserve
The
stories we wrote together,
Emotional
documentation
Of
who we once were.
In
this life
It
may hurt too much
To
keep going on.
But
here it remains
In
my heart,
Just
as fresh
As
an open wound on a battlefield.
On
my soul remain scars from when
You
used me as a stepping stone,
You
took aim and sniped at my own self-worth,
You
broke your promise to go nowhere,
You
chose your friends over me,
You
ran from me into the arms of Jesus,
And
locked up your drowning heart.
I
should clean the wound,
Bind
it, take my pill,
And
numb myself to the pain,
But
I'm too much of a glutton for life.
Contrary
to what is popular and sensible,
I'll
ache and bleed
From
my heart and soul
Because
we have been together.
Pieces
of you
Are
now pieces of me
In
an awkwardly shambling mass
Of
small tokens, aging memories, and abiding pain.
In
this society
I
am a kleptomaniac.
In
this civilization
I
am grossly inefficient.
And
in your view,
I
am probably sad and misguided.
But
in this world
I
have to create my own meaning.
In
this time
I
can't forget where I've been.
And
in this life
These
pieces of us are everything.
Wherever
you go,
Pieces
of you will remain with me.
Whomever
I find myself with,
I
will keep these pieces of you safe.
After
hundreds of seasons melt and fade away,
Pieces
of you will live on inside of me.
To
this day and into the distant future
I
will never forget
The
flag dancer who traveled with me to Jupiter,
The
sweet, innocent trumpeter,
The
dark-haired and dark-hearted courtesan,
The
animal rescuer from the mountains,
The
twisted waitress with the soul full of poison,
The
mother who barely escapes annihilation every day,
The
passionate lover whose hearing fades slowly,
Or
my best friend who reached for me across an ocean and a year of
deathly silence.
These
pieces of you
May
weigh me down,
Play
unbidden, vivid images in my mind,
And
wound me for the rest of my life,
But
I will never give them up.
Perhaps,
on a rainy afternoon,
If
only in brief passing,
After
we've become
A
little wiser,
A
little grayer,
And
life, love, laughter, loss, and loneliness
Have
worn paths across our faces,
You
and I will meet again
And
forgive, embrace, recriminate, blame, avoid,
And
remember each other.
But
here I remain
With
these pieces of you
Still
in my hands, my mind, and my heart.
Despite
society's expectations,
Contrary
to your wishes,
And
regardless of my pain,
I
will carry these pieces of you.
N.G.
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