One Hundred and Seventy Five

I kissed somebody.
In a chilly rainfall, on a lukewarm night
with slush on the streets and a yellow glow overhead
I - we - waited until it picked up
and it stopped being drizzle
and started being rain
and then kissed.

How was it?
None of your business, really.
I wanted to say
I'm sorry it had to be right at your apartment.
I didn't plan that.
I know
I know because you told me so many times
when you shouldn't have
I know that you were so certain you'd be my first
my first a lot of things
but you weren't.

And you never will be.

I'm sorry. I don't mean to be happy to spite you.
I just am.
Maybe with time you'll learn to be, for me.

One Hundred and Seventy Four

I wonder if I'll ever have to find you again, some day.

If I'll lose you. and have to find my way back to you.
I wonder if I'll lose you
and be okay with that.

I wonder if I can't do this.
I wonder if all my wonders are more than wonders, they are facts about me, not incapabilities, but mannerism, but character, but the way I am built. I wonder if I can't do this.

I wonder if I can
and think I can't.
I wonder if I will think I can't.
I wonder if you'll become a regret,
a very distant memory in this blog. (One of many.)

I wonder if one day
I will sit on the bed of someone
stroking their knee
kissing their cheek
caressing their hair
and tell them
in the most hushed voice and pained expression
about someone I knew
back when I lived in Montreal.

One Hundred and Seventy Three

You

are so passive aggressive.
You are hands down the most passive aggressive person I have ever met.

It handicaps you. It literally prevents you from moving forward. You are so close minded, so dead set in your haughtiness, you are so certain of yourself that you are incapable of bending to reality, you are incapable of keeping your head focused. You are impossible to talk to.

If you are upset

be upset.

Be irritated. Be hurt. Be loud.

Do not smile.

I am not your friend.
Not today.

And

and maybe not tomorrow.

One Hundred and Seventy Two

I wasn't always like this.

and I know that's such a general statement, and not very specific, and unclear in its optimism, realism, security and reliability. I know that. I know this. I know me.
I haven't always been like this.

I think I liked it better, sometimes.
Sometimes, not all the time, but sometimes, I think I liked it better
I liked you better.
I liked me around you better.
I liked us better
cos we meant less.

One Hundred and Seventy One

I've been having this dream lately.

After a few years of giving up on all of it, all of the work and writing and crowds. After giving in, and letting loose, I realize I'm lost. So lost, too lost in myself, in my ambition and drive, in the mess of these people, in the flashes of reviews and waves of criticism, it's too much.
It's too much and I lose myself.
I lose myself, still so young, with something I thought I was willing to give.
But it isn't a life I need to live. Not really.
I lose myself and come back
'back'
and you don't meet me at the airport.

But you invite me to your place, with the same smile, with a familiar tea in a familiar mug, and we sit and smile and talk of the stars and diaries and success. And when I get up to leave, you hug me, so quickly, so briefly, the briefest of holds, and turn away in pain. I realize I should say something, but I don't. Instead I take my hat and tip it, shrug on my coat.
And then
I say your name, softly. I don't mean for it to be a whisper but it is, and you turn back around and kiss me. You inhale and fall towards me, close your eyes and kiss me, your arms on my shoulders and fingers on my neck, I can only drop my bag and hold you close, with a fierce and desperate loneliness and confidence. It's familiar, and right.

Thank you for finding me you say
and I can't shake the need to say it back to you.


You know

I never meant to store a feeling of home in you.
But I think I have.

One Hundred and Seventy

I realized I haven't thought about you much, this break.
For perhaps the first time in a very long time, I have not thought about you.

I don't feel as though that's a betrayal.
I know you don't.

It's just new. Not thinking about you.
I haven't done that, in so long, have I.

I miss you, though. Still.
I do.
But I think I'm letting go.

One Hundred and Sixty Nine

Hey.

I'm sorry.

I made a mistake.

No one will ever love you
the way she does.

I'm sorry. I pushed you into the wrong arms. I see that now. It may be too late, it may be just in time, I don't know, I can't tell. But I'm sorry. I meddled when I knew I shouldn't have but thought it was for the better. I was silly. I was so silly. I'm sorry. I don't know how late it is, I don't know if there's anything left to fix. I don't know what more I can do. But I don't know how to not tell you this. I'm so sorry.

I think
I think you've made a mistake.
I made one, too.

No one will ever love you the way she does.