We want the same things
To be loved and seen
But I’m not enough
To fulfill your loss
Didn’t I try? And
Didn’t you prove how
Empty my love was?
We continue this
Tired dance, this way
And that; we don’t want
To leave, and don’t want
To stay, and so we
Shuffle endlessly.
Am I satisfied
With this life, or just
Exhausted and dry
Tell me you’re okay
Talk like you used to
Please reassure me
We don’t talk anymore; I
Pretend it’s mutual but
It was you who decided.
Perhaps I wasn’t good for
You, though I always tried to
Be good to you. For the best,
I tell myself, while the you
Shaped hole in me aches, empty
It makes me itch not
To talk to her, but
I hate myself less
I planted my misery
Deep in the ground, hoping it
Would die and leave me in peace
Instead it blighted my crops
Withered my orchard, left me
Desolate, dry and barren
What am I To you?
A secret smile?
A guilty pleasure?
Or nagging burden?
The weight of your sins
Prolonging your grief
What am I to me?
An object of pride?
Or subject of scorn?
The butt of a joke?
What I try and hide
But cannot escape
What are you to me?
A moment’s daydream?
A light in the dark?
Possible future?
Or delusion to
Ease longing’s dull sting
They have replaced my broken
And tattered heart with a dead
Man’s, so now I can live. But
What will become of my soul?
Invisibly I
Glide through throngs who are
Enraptured by phones
Herman’s Hermitage 