you, me

formerly, we

now when i'm lost i search for you. are you looking for me

us. we. how it 'used to be'.

there was never a forever but i can laugh and say

it was nice when it lasted. and it lasted. not long enough.

i still pretend that you are a part of me, really,

but we,

we fell too far for me to remember where we were before

or why.

why i lost you. or

you lost me.

I remember in particular one pine tree I climbed in front of the elementary school, one evening when my mom was staying late and I was out there completely alone. A beautiful feeling is being alone but not feeling lonely. Not wanting anything. Hearing all the sounds you could never hear before. The wind. The quiet sound of the occasional car drifting by, some distant laughter from some distant family. You don’t think to yourself, somewhere someone is dying and I can’t save them. You think, somewhere a baby is being born. You don’t think, death is inevitable. You think, life is beautiful.

So

Here are a list of things that aren't.

-Life(sorry)

-Happiness(sorry again)

-Sadness(contrary to popular belief)

-Love(probably)

-Me and you(although we will end at different times)

-The Earth(it's on a downward spiral)

-The universe(most likely)

-Time(??)

but most of all,

not this line

(it goes on forever, beyond the paper

and beyond the reaches of our feeble minds.

essentially, this line

lasts longer than us)

cold pavement dying fire

distant screams tears of joy quiet talking

headlights beaming car motor oven whirrs

plates and napkins forks and knives death and life

talk of nothing repeating forever never

homework dishes soft rain crashes

blinding sunset purple clouds

deafening silence

We are all dying, I think to myself as I step outside into the sunlight. It's going to rain tomorrow and everyone knows it. It's going to rain tomorrow and there's nothing I can do to stop it.

There's some sort of buzzing silence surrounding me as I step forward onto the grass, each step making a small rustle. Everyone is so mortal, so painfully mortal, that it makes me smile. In two hundred years this grass will be long gone and so will I. Maybe the sapling in our front yard will live or maybe it will be blown away by the winds of uncertainty. It's sunny now but it won't be sunny forever.

If it rains, it rains. Scientists predict that tomorrow the world will still be spinning. Maybe if I run fast enough I can jump off this flat Earth and thrust my lifeless body into the freezing sun once and for all.

~

At church I too put my arm around you.

Thanks for loving me even when I was unlovable.

Thank you for being my mom although sometimes it feels like we're eons away.

At church I get annoyed when you sing too loudly

You always talk to me too much and too loudly sometimes just to fill the silence when the silence doesn't always need to be filled.

But thank you.

For talking.

You didn't help me like I wanted you to when I had my panic attacks.

You don't always say or do what needs to be said or done

And I think there was a point at which I thought you could do nothing wrong and got mad when you did

But I'm past that point and we are all so flawed and

At least you were there.

Thank you for never really leaving.

i am alone in a sea of unfamiliar faces

they move forward like a wave and i am drowning

my eyes burn, my throat burns, i don't know what i need.

please talk to me, please pull me out

give me someone to focus on, someone to talk to

yellow shirts. yellow shirts. we are wearing yellow today.

we are sunflowers. we are growing.

i still dream of you and i see myself in that longsleeve yellow shirt

on the day i fell in love and it's funny the things we remember.

i forget your face but you are somewhere in this sea.

when i see you i will know it's you

you will be glowing with radiance and i won't feel so alone.

i'm still a kid and i'm still tripping over my feet.

you are still older than me and you are still next to me.

on my left. always my left. your juxtaposition is just right.

in this sea.

and our arms brush.

and you walk faster.

and i am drowning again.

For what feels like ten years ago,

I fell down into this wet, cold cavern

I still can see the circle of sky,

the color of Bluebell,

from the mouth of the well.

I still can hear others’ laughter

when it echoes down against the stone walls.

I still can talk to the rare people who nearly fell

and discover me in the hidden well.

The salty water chills me to the bone,

as well as the stone walls that surround me.

I’ve forgotten the feeling of warmth, where I dwell,

 here in the cold and lonely well.

I tread the water for as long as I can,

to keep my face surfaced above the water.

Sometimes I try to climb up the walls,

but I slip on the mossy stone.

Other times I grow too tired from the energy I expel

and let myself sink deeper into the well.

I find that it’s so peaceful and calm,

submerged in the salty water.

I want to sink deeper and stay there forever,

but I resurface each time and smile up 

at the light shining down bright like a golden bell,

unlike the dark and murky ocean water of the well.

The years passed by and by,

as I could tell from down here.

It was spring when the chirping of newborn birds,

echoed down the walls for me to hear.

It was summer when I was most found

by wondering kids who discovered me.

It was autumn when I saw flames of color,

with red, yellow, and orange leaves falling and gathered.

It was winter when I would beg to die, unable to leave the hell

of the frigid, bone-chilling water of the well.

I sometimes try to forget,

that I’m stuck at the bottom of this hole in the ground.

My mind floating away to escape into a land of fantasy with dreams of freedom,

where I can imagine the warmth of what love is, but I can never really feel it.

When I finally recall where I still am, reality breaking the spell,

I float in the water made from my own sorrowful tears which fill the well.

My brain and heart are split in two,

my brain sees the lines between the stacked stones as bars that cage me,

in my heart, I have fallen in love with the way the moss feels against my feet,

like soft green velvet along the stone below the water.

My mind is so broken that I can’t decide,

whether I want to be saved or if I should just stay.

I’ve been down here too long, as I can tell,

for I don’t know anything but this well.

I can not even imagine

what life is like outside of this hole,

outside its cool air and wet walls?

Was I ever not in this wellspring?

Was I ever running free on the earth above?

Were there people I knew before my fall?

Did they even know of my fall?

If so, do they know how I ended up down here?

Because I can’t remember how this happened to me.

Did someone tell me to jump in?

Was it a dare? Was I pushed in?

I traverse the forest of memories in my mind,

as I desperately search for an answer.

Sometimes I think I have found an answer to tell,

only to have it slip through my pruney fingers like the leaves that fall into the well.

I’ll probably never hunt down the answers

Should I accept this fate of mine?

Why am I in this hell?

Being forever trapped in this well.

My fate proving true as the water level drops 

whenever my tear ducts dry up for days,

Leaving me mindlessly treading the water.

The hole grows smaller as though tiny cracks

the water would dispell

until my tears start to refill the well.

A few months go by and I’ve come to accept this situation that I’m in,

That I can never leave this dank hole.

But it’s mossy stone walls are my home in which I dwell,

and I’m always held and rocked to sleep by the calm tear sea of the well.

But something isn’t right,

I can’t call my home by just “the well”.

No, this hole is special, it’s something more for me to retell,

This is mine, and mine alone, no one else will have my well.

I’m finding myself sinking more and more,

losing my motivation to keep my head afloat.

Haven’t I been in this bore long enough for me?

I deserve to let my peaceful fantasies become real with a spell

and allow me to leave my well.

How easy it would be,

to just stop treading the water.

To sink deeper than ever before,

and reach the bottom of this waterhole.

To never have to feel myself cry anymore,

submerged and unable to tell new tears from the old I dispell

that make up the water of my well.

The voices in my mind have kept me company

for the years I’ve spent all alone.

But even now, they are just telling me to say farewell,

to give into the ache of my bones and just sink down in my well.

I’m just tired.

Tired of trying to survive.

Of searching for the reason of why I fell.

Of the questions echoing in my mind like my choked sobs off the stone walls.

I’m done with coming up with no answers to tell.

I’m done with the lonely silence of my well.

What am I to the outside world?

I do nothing to contribute to anything

as I’m just down here in this spring.

I’m not helping anyone,

and no one is helping me with getting out of here.

I have no worth in this world,

how can I have any worth when I’m barely living.

I’m a nobody.

Just a broken, tired body.

No one would care if I gave up and gave my soul to sell.

No one would even know if I just drowned silently in my well.

I give into my exhaustion,

and sink down into the teary ocean.

My lungs burn for air as I stay under,

my body screaming out to surface.

I ignore my lungs pleas and let myself go limp

my thoughts leaving, one by one they each fell

as I sunk lower in the murky water of my well.

The closer I get to drowning,

My body takes over in panic and finally pushes itself up, breaching the surface.

Gasping for breath as the fresh gulps of oxygen

clear the fog in my brain from half-drowning.

I’m not sure if I’ll attempt to escape another way again,

but for now, I’ll just remain as I am,

living on the endless ride of a carousel,

treading the tearful ocean of my well.

It feels so marvelous to have been broken. To have been shattered and to have put the pieces back myself. To have glued them the wrong way so there are still holes where love and pain can seep through.

 Let me be your vase. Let me be your vice. Let me be yours.

 Tape up the holes in my heart with the strongest tape imaginable. Pour water in me until it bursts through. 

Hold me but not too tightly. Make me feel like a work of art, like a rare collectible. Pay a high price for me. Love me just the right amount. 

This glue is fragile and I don't know how much longer I'll be whole. Love me for the pieces that won't fit. Love me for me. Don't mend the holes and don't pour in water. Put flowers in and watch them die.

 Pity them and pity me for the things I lack. 

Let me gather dust and disintegrate and don't love me enough to let me go. I'm not worth anything now anyway, not now that I am broken.

 It was your arm that carelessly knocked me off the table. So where were you when I broke? The sound must've woken you. 

I am gone now but you think of me.

 You've filled your house with new vases and told everyone you'll be alright. You miss me and the glass edges that made your fingers bleed.

 You miss my fragility and my fortitude. 

I miss you but I forget why. You didn't let go of me, I let go of myself. I wish you'd have been there to see me fall, I was so beautiful.