Love: Me, Lissa
Dear John,
Did you know it was spring when I first met you?
Remember field day, the way the leaves moved ever so slightly back and forth in the breeze,
I remember the way the sun shone so brightly, and how so dully it paled when it touched your skin
I was waiting in that awful long line, waiting for a chance to move up a couple people,
Walking fast, making no eye contact; who knew one wrong move would get me here,
It was one wrong flicker of the eye that made us meet
I remember thinking you were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen
I can’t say it was love at first sight, but you were the only thing on my mind that afternoon
Days flickered like pages of a book after that,
Summer came and went and soon I was sitting a seat in front of you in the bus,
I thought I was the luckiest, but luck only went so far
So I sat there conjuring ways to make talk, never actually acting on it
And then one day you randomly pretended to drop a paper boat on my seat,
I still have it you know? I tapped it to the inside of my journal,
Where my soul lies in the shape of many forms
I might no longer be with you, but you will always be a part of me.
You claimed I didn’t care about you,
That my heart was somewhere else,
And I was never open to giving answers, but the truth is it always lay beside you
But you, you claimed to love me,
Such a cruel assertion from a soul that never spoke
Maybe they were easy words between strangers
You said we were friends, but friends don’t lie
I knew more about you than you wanted to know about me and that itself lacked,
You always used to say that I blamed you for our fallouts, I think that was your own conscious speaking to you
It sure spoke more than we did,
For the lonely person that you didn’t claim to be, you were always ‘busy’
I think you were always afraid,
Maybe I should’ve shown you that love wasn’t surrendering to the fact that being with someone is simply better than being alone,
Because it isn’t constant tossing, like turning a pillow over to feel the cool side;
It isn’t too hot or too cold, it’s perfect
Perfect, because everything is so balanced, so comfortable you don’t notice it
I know, it’s too late now, arguments are incoherent without an opposition;
And you’ve gone so far and out of my reach,
Some things are just never the same again, they slowly wear down and lose energy,
But I realized: that no matter where you are, or who you’re with, or what you’re doing;
When it comes down to it, I will always,
honestly, truly, and completely
have loved you.
Love,
Melissa.