Snippets

I conjured that delusion up so vividly,
If you had seen my dreams,
You wouldn't have wanted to wake up either.

Sometimes I become ungrateful thinking about what we could've been,
But then I think about what the world would have been if every prayer was answered (it wouldn't have been) and thankfulness sinks into me like my heart used to, at your indifference.

He envied the people in pain, the way their eyes sang poetry, the way they knew some secret lost on him. How he longed to feel that love, that pain, that artistry.

Something reminds me of standing in that airport lounge, watching as cities of the world swirled across the screens, as planes landed and took off. Somehow in that moment the possibilities had seemed endless. Somehow, still, in that moment I knew I would carry your image in my heart still the same, that no matter how far I ran, I wouldn't be able to outrun this.
And isn't that humbling?
How do we lay claim to the world when we can't even lay claim to our own hearts?
I was a human who had always taken pleasure in having control over my own life. Planning and re-planning and scheduling, everything had always seemed like it was in my own hands.
It was only when I saw you, that the illusion disintegrated into dust and ash, was blown away like it never existed and I realized that my hands had never held any power at all.

8, he said, was his name. 8 like the Mobius strip, like infinity. In his not regretting how much he loved, in letting it all go anyway, in not holding back, in all the hardships that made him who he was, I saw not a man but a legend. And I wondered if that one scar on his asymmetrical face had always told his lover that too. That maybe she too had seen the vulnerability behind his strength, the true face behind the mask. And so she had left so it could be visible to many others, who would become legends after him, from him.