You were determined to not be temporary. I’ll give you that.

While I was doggedly, “we’ll see”, you knew we would be something more.

I scorned your innocence, while also being jealous to the core.

I fled in fear. It was too easy. And I absolutely wouldn’t let you in without a fight.

But you did. And you did. And oh how my walls crumbled. Slowly to begin but then every last stone came down.

Nothing temporary now. I hope.

Together we rebuilt these walls with love and promises and visions of our future.

Fear still lingers, licking at the edges - to be expected - but now we are safe inside our rebuilt walls. Together we keep the demons at bay.

It was a flicker in the darkness.

That was all.

As I lay cold and unfeeling,

the perpetual inkiness kept itself

closed tightly around me.

I hung on though.

Waiting to see it again.

Hoping.

There it was! Shining bright and

then gone. Vanished.

But the halo of its memory

remained. Burnt into my vision.

Slowly, I crawled towards its ghost and waited.

The flicker came again. This time I was

ready to be engulfed.

Struggling over the words to place side by side to express emotion.

She’s torn by conflicted feelings.

A smattering of happiness dapples over the dark shadow of anxiety that sits with her.

Waiting for the cloud to pass is a never ending story, so it seems.

Yet time keeps ticking and plans keep being made. And broken. Forgotten. Hidden.

Self love. Self worth. Self growth.

All of these things she aims to achieve and strive for, yet she doesn’t know how.

What is the purpose of it all? She asked once, hoping for an epiphany.

Friends. Family. Love. Came the reply.

But it all sounded so feeble to her lonely, lost heart.

Like this poem, she is a muddle. A confuddled confusion of everything combined together in an attempt to try and understand the world she finds herself in.

It isn’t your world. It isn’t the world her parents expected for her. It isn’t even the world she woke up in last week. She’s changed a few times since then, you see.

Yet, despite what she expected, she’s still here.

Still striving.

Still hoping and trying to untangle the web of silly string that is her life.

And, more importantly (probably), still hoping and trying to make it joyous along the way.

Hope. She still clings to it. (Thank god.) For hope is her life-raft in this turbulent, fucked up sea.

Oh, and she? She is me.

"You wont find love in someone else until your love yourself." She told me quietly; believing it to be true.

"Are you fucking joking?" Came my venomous, spiteful reply. "How can you believe that to be true? I have never loved myself - not once. I have never found in myself anything truly worth loving. But I love hard. And long. And desperately. And with everything I have." I gasped then; laughed, bitterly. "If that's true, I am dead in the water. A goner. A waster. Because I have never loved myself. But him? Oh, him. I loved him with all of my being. And I can't do that again for nothing. Not ever."

I clung to the idea of

you long after you were gone.

Believing timing was our nemesis.

Discovery of reality splinters

my chiseled heart.

Timing was irrelevant.

Groping for some explanation, now

I cling to the threads of my dignity.

The apology slips from my mouth

before I can stop it.

I bite my bottom lip with frustration.

I'm not sorry.

Yet I have this inherent need

to tell you I am. Because you

can't dislike me. Or think I'm crazy.

Crazy. The crazy scale.

Where I feature at about a 7 out of 10....

self proclaimed.

But what makes me crazy?

A deep-routed need for validation.

Is that crazy? Or just circumstance.

Just a need for you to understand me.

Tell me straight. No games.

I've been lost in this maze for too long.

I'm tired of wandering.

Wondering.

Just because you saw

my smile doesn't mean

you've seen my soul.

If you're not brave

enough to breakdown

my walls you don't

deserve my heart.

I'm holding out for

someone stronger

than you can ever be.

Battle for me, and

I'll give you my love;

fight against my demons,

I'll give you my world.

These hairline cracks cause more

pain than gullies. When the damn

bursts we allow ourselves to be

washed away and we mourn.

But the smallest pin prick of

rejection causes a chain

reaction. It's a terrible metaphor,

but our heart breaks.

It doesn't shatter; we're

protecting ourselves from that

already.

Just a paper cut.

But it seeps into the chest and

resonates throughout our entire body.

An ache that hangs around

our heart and occupies our mind.

Wanting to shut the door on

wanting but afraid of missing what

stands on the other side.

I remember the day you began

following me outside,

to stand on the driveway and

wave goodbye until I was out of view.

No matter what the weather

you would stand there

- never any shoes -

and I would hang my arm

out of the window and

wave frantically until your

quivering lip disappeared.

Your eyes would follow me

around the corner, as I carried

your heart in my hands.

But all these years I knew,

I carried more fear than you.

You, I was told repeatedly,

when I called to check you were ok,

had recovered quickly.

Back to playing with your tea set;

reading your magazine;

texting your best friend;

fighting with your boyfriend...

But the fear followed me.

What if I left you, too, and your fear

- however seemingly fleeting, still there -

had been true?

What on earth would you do?

And now, I stand on the driveway

- feet bare -

and I wave goodbye to you,

until you are out of view.

And it's you who hangs from the

window waving frantically.

Although, you never quite

wait until I disappear, and

I see for a second what that

fearless life could be,

before I return indoors to wait on

the text that tells me you

made it safely.