Sunday, April 29, 2018

Broken Spring Robins

Robins are nestled near the roads for warmth, and they flee from my car, slowly, heavily, uncertainly. I'm not used to being up so early. They're not used to being here in the cold.

I slow the car and let them fly clumsily away, comrades. I cannot fault them their confusion.

Deer cross the road, still in their winter coats. I let them pass, looking for stragglers. Trying not to think about what this all means for our earth. For our future. I shake my head and look to the bright sun rising.

Small victories. A strange detachment. Has having no phone brought me closer to some? I wonder who I have been alienated from, in the meantime, but... still. I sit with him, and I have so much to say. We let the awkwardness pass, the newness, and touch doesn't feel forced. I wonder what time will bring us. I accidentally slip a hint of the future, and I wonder at myself.

How do people pick themselves up, over and over again?

I realize, as I drive, that he fucked her. Stupid of me. I remember how he told me he kept to himself when we were apart, and then, the photo, the one of them as a group. Non-assuming. I remember how she was texting him as she drove through his town, and I saw it, and I said, she likes you, and he said, yes. I remember, more than anything, how he made me feel like I was so so small for questioning it. I remember how he scolded me sharply for wanting an answer, for wanting reassurance, and how my eyes welled up with tears. I excused myself for the bathroom, and he said, no, kiss me first.

What horrible manipulations. I want to be angry, but I'm trying to let it out of my mind. I'm trying not to be the woman he destroyed. I'm working to not be a broken person holding these hurts against another.

So I shut it out of my brain, in the rosy purple dawn with lovely deer crossing my path, and I pretend it never happened. Even if I wanted an answer now, he would lie. My gut knows the answer.

I shove it all down, all the fear and anxiety, all the overflowing stupid love that was used against me. I let him use me against myself. I let love be a weapon.

Love, I remind gently, mouthing the words in my simple quiet car. Love is not a weapon.

Strangely, there's one I wish I could share this with, but I've made the choice to leave her behind. Love is not a weapon, but it can be used to hurt. I look into the sun creeping up, turning pink and red and bright on the horizon, and I know he will never be happy. Such as he, he will never be happy.

Such as her, I do hope she will be.

Such as me. I can only pray for the best.

Thursday, April 26, 2018

Reclaiming

I'm reclaiming things - scent sights and sound
I thought I'd buried in the ground
things that haunted still my mind
I felt that I should leave behind
but I see now there's no sense in blame
you never truly made the claim
and no they were never fully lost
I myself just paid the cost.
So I collect back these things which give me joy
and a lesson which I'll now employ -
nothing's gone one cannot steal
the mind's a trick, loss isn't real
and if I make the choice to fight the theft
I'll find them right where they were left.




Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Stay

I'm learning passion isn't love
and I'm not so glad I tried it
because it showed the worst in me
and I'm not someone who can hide it
but I picked up all my faces
and I hold them out, palm open.
this life has brought me many places
but I'm slowing down and hopin'
you will see all my blackest truths
and you will not turn hard away
and that I go slow is my proof
I may be hoping you will stay

Monday, April 23, 2018

4-23

The remains of the sun paint the water in roses and yellows, and the cantankerous geese hoot gently and swim in circles, black silhouettes against the sunset. Bats dart through the air, collecting dinner.

It is nice, it is calming, and I forget I'm exhausted, I forget to be chilly for a few minutes.

What a careful navigation of a new person. Finding the new lines. Treading so lightly.

But I am glad of the light movement. I am still easing myself back in, evaluating. I need to be ready to put a terrible love behind me and move forward without dragging haunted pieces into the future.

So we stand quietly a little apart, and watch the birds and the bats, and I am curious about the possibilities, but I am also so tired, and my heart is a little bruised, and so it feels good just to stand there wondering without the pressures of expectation.

Saturday, April 21, 2018

The Coldest Soft Person

The dogs are playing a silly game under the deck, popping their heads out at one another and barking, growling, like little soil-covered trolls. I want to muster up some scolding for them  - they're filthy, they're teasing one another and snarling and snapping,they've dug a crevasse where there once was straight lawn - but I know it's an outpouring of energy from being left all day, and it all seems in good fun, so I let it go.

Robins are calling in the trees above the yard so I watch them, rotating through the branches, and wonder, like the dogs, what sort of conversation they are having. I note, also, that somewhere in my life, I learned to differentiate the calls from a robin among those of other birds, and I feel a very vague, very small sense of accomplishment for this small bit of knowledge.

I drink my Michigan wine which tastes very much like grape juice, but I live in wine country now and I want to adapt, and I let the sun slowly move downward. Now and then I get up from the deck and pick up old cigarette butts the previous homeowner cast aside, soft and feathered with age. I've been doing this for months now- they seem to burrow up from the earth as spring comes like buds.

Lucy is in a strange mood, and I wonder if Ryan has set her off. I think she is cured, I have fixed her, until I see her interact with others. She bites at me as I bend, too calm and tired to be angry with her, and, deftly, I watch her moving like I would watch a fly landing on me - hand moves and I snatch her scruff in my hands and flip her onto her back. I sit on her body until her frantic tail calms and the spell has passed, and I return her to the yard, herself again.

What a strange life.

I sit upstairs alone, a kitten down my shirt, its tiny tiny ill voicebox the softest rumbling purr against my skin. Her face is caked with milk and food, crusty and hard; I pick hard pieces of the fur around her eyes where infection has oozed. She is strong today, and comfortable against me, and she's calming me, whether I know it just then or not. I look down at her small closed eyes and my chest wants to swell, but I won't quite let it. I think of all the beautiful little kittens I have loved, who have lain on me just so, who died unexpectedly, or expectedly. I will give it time, and a little piece of love, and see how it progresses, before I let my heart open all the way.

He seems to understand. I am opening up, a little piece at a time, about myself and how I feel, and I am relieved when he doesn't pull away from it.

I am the coldest person in a room of melted ice cream people.

How have I become cold? Or am I just feeling cold by comparison?

And someone, always, must be that person, right? Someone with a mush heart must still make the hard choices.

I remind myself, looking down at the small breathing thing comforted by my heartbeat, curled against me, reliant on me for food and warmth and care, that I may feel so, but I am not cold.

He reminds me that I am not cold. And I admit, it feels good to hear. But part of me says, he is new. Maybe, over time, he will decide that I am cold after all.

As Dorian said.

But Dorian made me cold. Never, before him, were things so black and white in my life. He has changed my perspective. I am not, and I do not think I will ever be again, so forgiving as I was.

The kitten wakes and crawls back to her siblings, and I sit on the floor beside my bed and wonder with a little bit of fear, just who I am now.

Thursday, April 19, 2018

PTSD

I'm pushing every boundary right from the get-go. I move things on the table to gauge his reaction, I toss my head and let everything spill out, my attitude is bubbling and overwhelming, my tongue sharp.

He laughs, he absorbs it. His energy feels good, he is curious, interested. Even when I purposefully push him too far, there's no undercurrent like Dorian, no electricity that sets my stomach on edge.

I wonder if it will last.

I don't want to be wondering all the time. I never had to wonder before, I took people at their word and their actions. I promised myself I wouldn't hurt anyone by punishing them for what he did, the terrible things he taught me.

I wonder if I'm ready.

I think I am. My hard edges don't feel so sharp these days, and I miss the feeling of tucking my head into someone, breathing, hiding for a moment from the world. Taking a secret beat for myself.

I hope he is patient.

Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Open doors

I think I'm finally ready.

We shall see.

I haven't dated since the Good one, the one I thought, oh, this makes up for the last one. This is what it's supposed to be like - minus the lying and cheating and overall mental warfare.

I've had lovely women ask me how I find these good men (this was before, of course, the best one turned out to be an entire complete violent mindfuck wrapped up into a handsome outgoing selfless package - who knew a hotdog was mislabeled as sirloin? I remember a woman asking, is he just the most wonderful boyfriend? and that strange moment I paused and reflected and had to say no, no, he's really not).

You know how, my lovelies? I wait. I screen. I pick and choose.

Even the pretty slim one, the one who made the same mistakes only maybe even worse with the mind-killer, because he loved me (I suppose) and he fucked her, she's said it too- where do I find them.

I find them the same fucking places y'all do, I just work harder. I have more patience. I sit with my god-damn hand in the water wriggling my fingers until they go numb.

Now is the perfect insert for a finger wriggling joke but I'll hold off.

I discard willy-nilly. I trust my gut. I don't give in. And, in the end, there's usually one, maybe even two, who remain in the pool.

So, somehow this feels like a major event. Moving on from the one that did me real damage. Onto the first one since the one that showed me a glimpse at potential. At what love might be. I'll always thank him for showing me that love doesn't have to be a gaping chasm of self-doubt and depression.

Ambitious as fuck, smart, outdoorsy. Cute, at least I think so.

Chemistry? We will see. Probably he's not a manipulative monster out to ruin me, so I just won't be interested. Such is life.

But we'll see. I think he'll benefit me in the long run regardless, based on similar interests and an overall violent striving to make something of ourselves. And, excuse me for saying, but I think I can benefit people in the long run too, if they choose to respect and make use of me.

This feels like a major event.

Ducks are lining up. Things are happening for me. Life is happening for me.

I don't know if love is in the cards. I always thought for me there would be one, and always, for me, there has been one.

I just hope to God I was wrong.

Excuse me for saying, but I'd hate to think I was wasted on him.

I always knew in my gut for me there would just be One.

Time will tell.

4-17

I'm not sure I want Bonnie and Clyde
There are more options than just die or ride
Passion was something, but where did it lead?
I'm left here alone with wounds that still bleed. 

Make me coffee when the dawn comes up and sit by my side on the deck
Let's enjoy silence while bringing in morning while other lovers are making a wreck. 

I'm getting too old to want my heart broken
I want me a man who means what he has spoken
I want peace and comfort, someone on whom I can lean
I want to know where he's going and hear what he's seen. 

I suppose that it's boring to dream up a dream where everything is just what it may seem
but my life has been chaos and I'm ready to find a man who will hold me and soothe my poor mind


Monday, April 16, 2018

Aloneness

The abandoned speedway is covered in sticky grey mud, but the dogs, thrilled to be free, fly over it, and so I will consider the consequences later.

We roam the empty arena, ugly in its design, beautiful in its strange loneliness and its green muck after the rain and snow. 

Last year I was camping and hiking around this time, heartbroken, pretending not to be. Always broken hearted and pretending I'm not hurt. 

Spring is holding off for me, it wants me to be ready. I nearly am. I feel strong and capable today. I enjoy my time alone, I take pleasure in watching my strong happy dogs, and no part of me wishes you beside me. 

I pace the empty bleachers, my shoes caked in mud, and I think about how you would pretend not to be bothered by the mud, but you would be irritated, and your tenseness would wear into me, and I would try to comfort you and you would tell me I was being ridiculous to sense such a thing and I would be hurt and question myself. Always a cycle. A cycle that ended in me doubting myself. You planted the seeds so early. On purpose? What had you planned when you met the girl who didn't love?

It's a very realistic reminder. I remember you tearing your jacket, denting your leather shoe. How angry you are under the surface. 

I wonder if it's easier with her far away, hiding who you are. Or perhaps you're calm with her. But then I wonder why you stayed. 

And then I don't want to wonder about you anymore. I thought to perhaps repair something once important to me, to patch it up, but what will that bring me but more pain. I feel adventurous and bold, here in this forbidden empty place, and I do not want to spiral. 

I feel the loss of my broken phone again, and I wonder if the other one, the Good one, has tried to contact me. He'll be leaving soon. Perhaps he thinks I abandoned him, and our patchwork will be destroyed. That would make me unhappy. But, I am glad we skipped this part, the falling in love and worrying part before he goes away. He would have still chosen to go, and we would have been broken hearted. We were both cowards to not face it, but we learn as we grow. I have learned to guard my heart more carefully. Loving him would have been fun, but we both knew how it would end.

I catch sight of myself in the area windows, bright and reflective, and I look happier than I have for a long time, and maybe even beautiful. I have not felt very beautiful for a long time - men are always using it against me, chipping away at my spirit, grabbing at it and me, possessing, jeering. I am not allowed to admire myself. I am not allowed to exist unless I intend to belong to someone.

I smile at my reflection and take a photo, and I think I look beautiful. 

I sleep hard, despite the silence, despite two dogs pressed tightly into me, despite a slim cat on my neck and whiskers in my nose. I am coming back to myself, and so far, it seems to be sticking. 

The potential for success is close. The potential for love, or, at least, a good friend, is nearby. Lifelines. I will keep swimming toward them no matter how tired my limbs. I have all the means around me to live the life I have always wanted. It is strange, that he changed that vision - for what, a year and a half, off and on? A vision of perfection I honed for nearly 32 years and it was completely thrown aside. I am shocked at myself, but I am getting it back; I know what is right for me. 

I would have, had he let me, been right for him. But he was never right for me. 

Sunday, April 15, 2018

4-15

Sing me a song, love, or tell me a story
Of those old days when princes were shrouded in glory
and love was an item so magic and rare
that they fought wars and burned cities o'er taking their share.
Write me a poem or hum me a tune
about swinging long swords and white breasts that are hewn
over treasures and maidens who stood by the side
of great heroes on horses gath'ring courage to ride.
Such great battles were fought that time cannot dim
the words of the splendor of the she that loved him
and I promise to listen and stop up my mind
when I'm wondering what kind of magic I'll find.
Time passes and gold gilds the goriest mark
and turns trauma to passion in the depths of the dark
and the women who stood by the side of these men
I wonder sometimes what their thoughts all have been
and how many were seeking a way to be free
and how many were quiet and yet wild just like me
and if they were given the slightest of rein
if they'd choose to be prizes and cause so much pain
I wonder if they looked at the fields soaked in blood
and the screaming and dying who lay in the mud
and I wish I could ask them, if given the choice,
if their people would pause and heed to their voice,
if they would have wanted to stand where it was that they stood
or if things may have been different if they only could
have been strong on their own feet, and made their own way
I wonder if they would have still chosen to stay.
But I'm sorry, my love, here I'm lost in my head
over stories of romance of heroes long dead.
Here, I'll close up my lips, and I'll listen, I swear,
to these stories of women with shimmering hair
and the men who did love them, at least, so we're told
in these stories of glory and princes of old.


Saturday, April 14, 2018

4-14

It was a hail Mary, but I somehow pressed reset.

A reminder, I suppose. The weather has changed, the air smells like dirt and rain, and it makes me think of happier times. I get caught up in nostalgia. I wonder how, though things have changed, I can tap into a few moments when I was happiest. Maybe find the shadow now, find the reality, the echo, but maybe there's still something there I can hold onto.

But the smells play a game, causing me to forget. Brief happiness and such a spiral afterwards.

I pick my mind apart, trying to find the reasoning behind, but there is none. It felt right so I did it. I felt bad and I wanted to find a way to feel good.

Somehow, I feel good.

Logic wars with emotion but for once emotion has cooled slightly.

It never mattered why, it doesn't matter what he tells himself to excuse it. I can never break into his skull and show him, make him feel, what he put me through.

That is who he is. I am ashamed I loved him. But I did.

I will be the mad love that was cruel to him, to all his tales. It doesn't matter. Those who know me know the truth. Including some of those closest to him. I still wonder, does he know that they wanted to keep me? Maybe I was wrong to let them go, let my depression cloud me. Maybe I should have waited until I felt good again. I would so prefer to stay with the people who want to keep me.

The clouds are parting though it's cold and damp outside, and I see a glimpse of something brighter. I see hope and opportunity. I see my hard work falling into place, so fast I can't even keep up with it, and I wonder why I still lay awake long into the night and pick over what went wrong.

Nothing went wrong. He is wrong. He is a sick individual I cannot cure. He can be her problem. He loves her, that's sure, but when it hurts me, I remember him - door open. So you're coming over.

Love does not mean he will be faithful. I have lost nothing. His love is worth so, so little.

I wonder how long this relief will last. It comes and goes so often. I have mourned and struggled for so long, but I have to be gentle on myself. Love, for me, is different, I think. I must handle things differently than others, I must be gentle on them as well. I cannot put it through my lens.

Gentle is not what I am best at.

I hit the worst this week. The worst came at me, it crushed me, and I realized how little control I have over life. I waited to be swept up and blamed and destroyed.

But I was not. I was protected, and trusted, and treated gently. I was given hugs and drinks and told it's not, not, not, your fault. You did all you could. You did it all right.

I am always doing all I can and yet the worst can still happen.

That is life. I did all I could with him and still the worst happened. That does not mean it was my fault. That does not mean I could have given more.

I am glowing from this protection. I have protected myself for so long, I am not used to running for safety. I am not used to being cared for in this way, and it is changing my perspective.

Life is terrifying and unpredictable. Things happen.

We make mistakes but all we can do is our best.




Friday, April 13, 2018

4-13

Bird are popping about between the earth and the trees and the sky, uncertain, just yet, if this spring has come to stay.

Somehow I have found myself an unexpected comfort among the days and the nights that have swarmed up against me lately.

I have made peace. It was not, perhaps, the way I might have envisioned it, but I can't deny the comfort of some little peace.

I am not quite happy for him, but I am at the brink. It would have been a waste of so much suffering, for this to fall to nothing. So many lies and so many tears, what for?

In a sense, it has been worth it. Not for me, by any means. My god. But a small portion of my heart is happy for him. On the brink of happy. And that feels good. It feels like the final stages of mourning.

I can't help but want to get a final jab in, but, hey, that's who I am. I never do go easily, do I? I still have untended hurts.

I remember seeing the first man I loved - or thought I loved, at the time - and his wedding photos, the girl he had chosen over me -- during me. It seemed worthwhile. I am never happy to be overlapped, but to be broken for a reason... that, somehow, is okay. I cried a little for him, and they were happy tears. Strange though. For him I am sure I have been long forgotten.

This week, this month, this year, has been such a spiraling upward and downward torment of optimism and hope, success and failure, pain and loneliness.

But it is evening out. The end is in sight. Early in the year, perhaps. Or perhaps it is just a lull. Like the birds, I am not quite ready to commit to this new opportunity. Perhaps it is a false peace.

I think, honestly, perhaps I have just needed socializing. People to talk to, to vent and confess. I feel much less mad these days. I am not a creature who thrives on keeping things inside.

I wish it had gone another way, a softer way. A forgiving way. A way that may have made smooth cobblestone steps toward understanding, but still, it feels right. I can listen to music again. I have been taking myself back this year, and a brief uncertain reaching out has shown me that I will be okay without him. I am sad, that to him I meant so little and to me he was everything, but, as I trudge day to day on this painful hard life, I acknowledge that it is so for many people.

To me, love was special and treasured.

But it is not so for many people.

Thursday, April 12, 2018

Uneven Zen

I'm reaching a level of zen, though it's shaky. Things in my life are back in place, calm and cool, and I can handle them again.

I feel my gut clench and I force it to relax.

This is life and I have to face it.

Maybe, I decided, I have to face him too. His happiness. This new life I keep denying he has. A woman he loves and gives, so easily, the things he denied me. Silly photos and trips. He convinced me it was so much to ask, so to see him, with her, providing them, smiling... these small things he told me were too much.

I can't decide how to deal with it. Immersion therapy is perhaps the one option I haven't tried.

Slam myself with images of him happy without me. God, he was so unhappy with me. I'll never understand why he stayed, and why he let me stay. It wore onto me, this unhappiness. I think we both wanted to be happy but so many walls were up. We threw weapons.

What did she do to take the walls down?

I'll never know,  and I tell my gut to relax. It's just life. Just keep living.

He loved me, that matters. He loved me wrong but he did. He loves her now, that matters. I want to come to terms with it and let it wash over me and away. I wake every day hurt and alone and I am so so tired of pretending he doesn't love her.

My life is my own, my path has veered sharply, but I am taking it with enthusiasm and bravado I don't quite feel. I need to own my choices. I need to calm my stomach and find a less shaky zen.

Sunday, April 8, 2018

Confessional Moments

I've listened to Speechless three times, crying and sobbing on the way home, my blood slimmed with alcohol and my victorious attitude somehow entirely deconstructed into misery.

My mind shies away from the current drama. She was right, this slight girl and her brief friendship that, much like my night, imploded in a series of progressively heart-breaking moments. She was right about some things though. Drama surrounds me. Do I create it, unintentionally? If so, how do I quit? I hate it. I hate how it touches me.

Men and their confessional moments, followed so quickly by anger. It's exhausting and I don't welcome it. My walls can't seem to drop at all, without some backlash. I comb through my mind looking for positive examples, for men who have been kind to me, for men or boys who didn't hurt me or strike out, for boys and men I couldn't destroy with a look or a word -- anything healthy. There's very little.

I think of my brother, calling me "honey" in the store, pretending to cozy up beside me as a young, ugly unformed girl -- it was a game, convincing strangers I was his. I think of my father, smiling smugly to himself, informing me in the supermarket that people think I'm his young lover, a half-smile of pride that he could accomplish such a thing.

Sick, sick, sick.

I did not learn until I grew up how sick sick sick my relationships with men have been. I look back at those moment, so many moments where I was not a human, I was not me, I was validation, and I am disgusted beyond comprehension. Cut my thoughts away; I did not need to exist. I was a body, I was a form, a doll used to stroke unhealthy egos.

Even now, it seems, I am not my own entity. I am a measuring stick for self-worth. I am unique, I am strong. To catch me means they are more than they expected, more than they see in the mirror (they knew there was potential hidden).

To fail means I am a bitch.

I think of Dorian, who I wanted to love me, and the walls he and I threw up between each other -- his retreat and my subsequent coldness. Why love when I can't be loved back? Whatever I did to him, whatever strange chemical I put off, it pushed him away, and I responded by retreating. What a glorious painful joke in retrospect, to pull away from the only one I wanted to go all in with.

Although, considering it's been nearly a year now that my heart has been broken, I can't help but be grateful. I don't know how I would have survived. I crank the old stereo up and cry harder, drowning in self pity. I want to lash out so he knows how long I've struggled, I want to exist somehow again to him, even briefly, even if it repulses him, so he can't continue to shunt off his guilt. He broke me entirely and I'm still picking up the pieces. And I'm furious with myself for not being healed.

The rational part of my brain is trying to click on, soothing me, whispering logic and comfort. The rational part of my brain thinks he is sick, and hopes he finds wellness, hopes he is happy. I did love him, after all. Don't we want those we have loved to be happy?

It's a constant war. I am not quite ready yet. Maybe one day. Maybe one day I'll be happy for those who have wronged me, but right now, I feel my largest accomplishment will be neutrality. One day, I will not care. Right now, that feels like enough. To feel nothing, in either direction. A horizon I race toward.

One day I will see him in a store, and maybe I can smile politely. Maybe I'll do nothing, I'll walk away. I won't feel broken, I won't feel lost. I won't wonder why he didn't love me as much as he loves her, when to me he was everything.

These people who are always falling in love, how? How? I want to break into their heads and bodies and understand, because something is different. Like the people who enjoy haunted houses, I can't fully grasp it. How can you enjoy this? How can it pass so quickly? I want to pour us into test tubes and examine the differences under the microscope. I feel like something important eludes me.

It was fun, briefly. It was fun with the second one, the one who was kind to me and touched my leg and kissed me in public. I enjoyed falling in love with him until the moment I did, and felt myself become vulnerable. I hid that love and I buried it and I waited to see what happened, and the moment he showed me he may not be careful with it, I gathered it up and I took it away.

 I can't go through this again. I can't risk it.

And yet I'm lonely. I have accidentally isolated myself with my home and my career, with my flashing burning drive to succeed and make something of myself, this desperate scramble to fulfill my dreams because I'm not sure what else to do with my time right now.

And in that, I've made no room for anyone new.

Maybe this was another wall, in the end.

I want to put myself out there and love, and be loved back, but I hide in my home and I make excuses and I hunt out a future where I am successful because that, I know, I can never regret.