"Is This What It Means To Fall In Love?"

By


I am always the first to love. Maybe I'm trusting. Maybe I'm optimistic. Or maybe I've made synonyms of these words, synonyms for desperation. Oftentimes I wonder, did I ever love him or did I love his potential? I am, after all, a writer. Plot-lines are my specialty and narratives might as well be my type. In some fucked-up, literary sense, the worst men always make the best stories. 


I am never the first to leave. When I love, I love with everything. Everything I have and everything I don't. I condition myself to think him worth it because, as I previously mentioned, I love the potential. Only now I recognize that it was never his potential, but the potential for me to feel something—to be known by somebody. To cry an array of tears in demonstration. To feel my heart splinter like a wishbone never wished upon. To think you the sky and me a beggar—to see you that way—with eyes like a typhoon, crying for you. This is what it means to fall in love but never reside in it. 

 

All of this to say, I am forever the one to lose. My sun burned out and my world froze over. I didn't eat for three days and I didn't even feel hungry—I didn't feel anything. But for him, it was like I never happened, like there was no thread twining his life to mine, no trust to be broken, no lies to be told, no unfolding stories, no illegible writing in place of a confession. Forever the one to lose, never the one who's lost—that's me. 


And so a fledgling heart nearing its first flight meets a retired set of wings. We weren't built to soar—just to stare off into indifferent futures, intricate and distant. That's the thing about potential—you see it, even when it's not there. You fall even when it's not there. Touch but never taste. Fall but never reside. 

Popular Posts

I Write This In Hope That You'll See It.

By
As I relentlessly pursue what most would call my delusion, I am far too yielding to you to let you go. This eclipse between dignity and infatuation cannot be explained, only justified to an unreasonable extent. Yes, I am running from something, but I'm still running to you. Yes, I am insecure, but only because I was taught to be. Where you see me clinging to fiction, I see my refusal to settle for what's in front of me.  Just to know you, to learn you slowly— that  is my desire. It's not about status, and it's not about appearance. It's about my enthrallment with your personhood. I'd never ask for more than one moment—one to listen, to be near, to be present—to show you more of myself in the hope that you'll see in me a glimpse of what I see in you.  Inadvertently, you've blurred the line between desperation and devotion. Whatever it is, I stand by it. Not because it's good for me. Not because I see a future. I'm still mulling over whether I even...
Read more

I Like Your Name Because It Rhymes with the Moon

By
I like your name because it rhymes with the moon. Do you even know mine? Or am I just the barista who's too young to be writing you love letters? I like your name so much, I remind people how to say it just to say it more. Did you ever tell anybody mine? Or was it just a happening—an encounter in passing—that I admired you from afar before I admired you from across the table. I remember that your birthday is August 23rd, which makes you a Virgo, a virgin woman. Mine is March 9th and I'm a Pisces, two fish in one. Your favorite flower is baby's breath, which I find to be unique. Mine is a marigold, if you ever wondered.  I know that you're sensitive. You don't like reminiscing about good times because they're gone. You tear up when you miss your family, I saw it. And sometimes, you feel like you're behind—like you're not where you should be in life. I think you hide behind self-development because you're scared to be seen vulnerable. But that's wh...
Read more

This Is Me Letting Go

By
I used to believe in love that burns slowly. Kind, considerate, and respectful—the kind that thrives within healthy bounds. I always imagined that life with you would feel more like a voyage, one that was scenic, one that taught us how to behold. The truth is, I just wanted to be held, too.  What you did,  what you broke —it bleeds past the heart. You've shattered my idea of marriage. You've incinerated every innocent notion I ever had about exclusivity. Was I ever something you cherished? Or have I always been occupied like land? Did you think an apology would cauterize my trust? That time would heal something arterial? Can't you see? My wound is infected, my blood is septic, and I am dying. While you're on some existential journey with your therapist, asking yourself, "Why did I do it?" I'm passing from one world to another, trying to be okay with being disrespected.  In my heart, I know that it's over, and every time I let you into my home, it feels...
Read more