♥(M)

            I remember summer 2009, we would drive to the beach and walk all day along the sandy shore- getting sand in our hair and shoes- just to find you necklace you lost last Christmas. You believed nothing is ever really lost. Yet I feel as I’ve lost you now.

            It’s been several years now, but I still check my calendar to see if you wrote any plans I wasn’t aware of like you used to. I still pray to God that when the phone rings it’s you. I still hope I’ll wake up to smell your unique scent painting my bed sheets. And I’m still nowhere near over you.

            I still ask your friends if you think about me- if you’re okay. I wonder if you know how heartbreaking it is to hear you found someone else. Does he treat you right? Does he rub your feet even after you’ve been sweating in your shoes the entire day after soccer practice? Is he worth it? Does he make you cry like I once did?

            There are some days I wish I could forget all of it. Just rip the concrete enforced duct tape keeping your face in my thoughts. But I’d coincidentally rip out my heart at the same time. How am I supposed to lie and keep a smile every day for the rest of my life when inside I’m crying?

            I still remember that October we went some bar that only allowed people with tattoos. I wonder if you ever knew it was just an excuse to tattoo a piece of me to you forever, Ms. Good girl. We got wasted that night. You felt bad when I rejected you- truth was I couldn’t even recognize you: because I had been waiting for years for you and never took advantage of any other girl.

            That Christmas was the best I’ve ever had and imagine ever will. You kissed me under the mistletoe and I asked you why. You said you promised yourself you’d lose your first kiss in the most cliché way possible and this just had to be the year it only rains twice in February. I kissed you again two moments later.

            That April I asked you to marry me, to run away far from here. You wanted to be a doctor- and that dream was becoming true. You decided it was more important than me. I used to stare at the clock wishing it could reverse.

            Now I’m just hitting my head against the wall hoping to forget it all.

♥

            It was raining today. I decided to bike to the beach. I told myself I just wanted to the see the water- but the truth was I was still looking for that dreaded necklace, hoping to find you too.

            The water crashed like my heart against the shore line, washing away my walls and bringing the pain to the surface. They told it was a first love, they said it won’t hurt in time. But the pain was just as fresh if not worse than that day.

            I love you, you whispered when the clock struck twelve, just before we kissed. And I remember crying because I had always thought I wasn’t worthy of you. And there I was with the girl of my dreams in my arms. My arms have since then frozen.

            I wouldn’t admit it to anyone but you- but when I turned and saw the tree- the weird tree you claimed to have planted as a child- with our cliché carving, a tear slipped out. But our initials were outside the heart- because we’re not confined to that small space on the bark. We have the whole world to hold our love.

            A glimmer of silver was all that held me together. Just by the big rock we used talk about our dreams on. Like a steel cable was driving me, I ran to find the object that caught my eye.

            And I cried, heart wrenching sobs: because I found it, but I lost you.

♥(F)

            I would stare in my mirror wondering if I could get surgery for a smile. Surely it shouldn’t be this hard. Not anymore at least. My eyes were the only things that never changed. Everything else slowly dulled. My eyes just continued crying.

            You could rip away my hair, you could burn my calendar, you could kiss my boyfriend and I still wouldn’t forget. Have you? Have you forgotten? Your friends say your fine. They sent me pictures of you smiling with your father. I’m glad you patched up your relationship.

            I still wonder to this very day if it was worth it. Were dreams that I had worked so hard for- ones that weren’t really mine to begin with- worth it? Would I change my decision if the clock could reverse? Would you convince me?

            I miss the taste of your lips. I miss getting tangled in your bed, begging time to stop for eternity- because there wasn’t anything I needed while with you. Was a man who knows more about his work than of me what I needed? Who was I trying to persuade? I knew I wasn’t fine.

            Do you think of me? Have you found my necklace yet? I hope you know I would trade a thousand of those necklaces to have you hold me again. I hope you know if were to wake up back in your bed with no worries, a couple hours to kill, and to hear you whisper in my ear sweet nothings again- I give it all up just for a few more minutes.

            Your name is burned onto my skin, in a place that belongs to you and you alone. And yet somehow your smile is tattooed deeper into my heart- a mark that can’t be removed through surgery or therapy or a thousand strange kisses.

            I only wish I’d slip away into a case of random amnesia and forget your face when I told you I had to go. I wish I’d hit my head hard enough to knock me back in time- to prove to you that a million miles could get in the way and I’d still need you.

            And even a short distance apart- I feel as if I could never reach you with a ten foot pole even if I tried.